What is Synthetic Phonics?

[LadyAberlin]

I was looking at Dancing Bears and I saw it referred to as synthetic phonics.

[ElizabethB]

Synthetic phonics teaches from part to whole, teaching sounds first and then building up to words by blending sounds together.

 

Analytic phonics teaches from whole to part, and is commonly how phonics is taught in programs with any sort of whole word/balanced literacy bias.

 

Synthetic phonics is most effective, then analytic phonics, then whole word/sight word methods.

 

Until Webster's Speller in 1783, phonics was taught analytically with syllables...that was much more effective than analytically with words, but synthetic is still best. (Webster taught synthetic phonics with syllables.)

[LadyAberlin]

Thanks! Synthetic was translating into my mind as fake phonics LOL

[cillakat]

It does sound 'fake' doesn't it?:iagree: Like somehow it's not as good as just 'phonics'. Synthetic phonics, iirc, came to be the common term in the UK for basically what we tend to call here 'explicit' direct instruction phonics.

 

Elizabeth wrote"<<Analytic phonics teaches from whole to part, and is commonly how phonics is taught in programs with any sort of whole word/balanced literacy bias.>>

 

One might also hear it called 'implicit' phonics. I, quite frankly, call it evil. While my 9 yo dd would be dyslexic regardless, implicit/analytic phonics as part of "balanced reading instruction" caused damage that literally has taken years to undo. "Balanced reading instruction" is simply the Whole Language Wolf -- sliding in under new name that makes it sound like a harmless sheep.

 

Elizabeth gave a great definition of synthetic phonics. I just wanted to toss out the other terms you might hear in usage - and toss in my own rant.:lol:

 

:)

K

[ElizabethB]

 

Elizabeth wrote"<<Analytic phonics teaches from whole to part, and is commonly how phonics is taught in programs with any sort of whole word/balanced literacy bias.>>

 

One might also hear it called 'implicit' phonics. I, quite frankly, call it evil. While my 9 yo dd would be dyslexic regardless, implicit/analytic phonics as part of "balanced reading instruction" caused damage that literally has taken years to undo. "Balanced reading instruction" is simply the Whole Language Wolf -- sliding in under new name that makes it sound like a harmless sheep.

 

Elizabeth gave a great definition of synthetic phonics. I just wanted to toss out the other terms you might hear in usage - and toss in my own rant.:lol:

 

:)

K

 

I agree with your rant. And while I tutored before having children so my own children were spared, I have tutored dozens of children and a few adults harmed by sight words, analytic phonics, guided reading, leveled readers, and other evils of "balanced reading instruction," so I see the pain it causes and try to stop it however I can. It only takes a little bit of sight words to cause a big problem, and it's 5 to 10 times harder to fix the problem than to just teach correctly in the first place.

 

And, before they get remediated, they suffer--they can't do well in other areas of school--even math, you have to be able to read word problems. So, they lose self-confidence. The boys generally act out and the girls generally just veg out. It's really sad, especially since all the evidence points toward explicit, systematic phonics.

[Jumping In Puddles]

Excuse me for the OT post but Whoa! I really had no idea teaching children to read a certain way can be damaging! How do I know if I'm doing harm?

 

For instance, today, I taught my son that ee says e. Then I gave him a bunch of words to read: see, bee, tree, sheep etc.

 

So when he had that down, I told him that ea also says e, then we did sea, tea, team, etc.

 

He already knows that that _ _ y says ee - like happy. So then I gave him sentences with ea, ee, _ _y in it all saying e.

 

I'm waiting for Abecedarian B to arrive, but until then, I don't have any materials to teach him, so I decided to wing it.

 

SO I SHOULD NOT TEACH HIM ANY SIGHT WORDS????????? Should I stop teaching him anything new until ABeCedarian B arrives so that I don't do any damage?

 

He knows: I, a, the as sight words.

Edited December 23, 2008 by Jumping In Puddles

[ElizabethB]

Excuse me for the OT post but Whoa! I really had no idea teaching children to read a certain way can be damaging! How do I know if I'm doing harm?

 

For instance, today, I taught my son that ee says e. Then I gave him a bunch of words to read: see, bee, tree, sheep etc.

 

So when he had that down, I told him that ea also says e, then we did sea, tea, team, etc.

 

He already knows that that _ _ y says ee - like happy. So then I gave him sentences with ea, ee, _ _y in it all saying e.

 

I'm waiting for Abecedarian B to arrive, but until then, I don't have any materials to teach him, so I decided to wing it.

 

SO I SHOULD NOT TEACH HIM ANY SIGHT WORDS????????? Should I stop teaching him anything new until ABeCedarian B arrives so that I don't do any damage?

 

He knows: I, a, the as sight words.

 

What you're doing is good! Most homeschoolers are doing fine, a few get bought into the Doman teach your baby to read books or the Dolch Sight Words, here's how to teach the Dolch sight words phonetically and why not to teach them by sight:

 

http://www.thephonicspage.org/On%20Reading/sightwords.html

 

The main problem is in the public schools. All the Catholic schools I've seen are good, and most of the Protestant schools are good, but some aren't. The secular private schools are a mix. I've never seen a bad reading program being sold at a homeschool convention! (We've moved 7 times in the last 10 years, and 3 times since I've been actively going to homeschool conferences, so I've seen a lot of schools and 3 homeschool conferences in 3 different states!)

[Stacy in NJ]

Dancing Bears is, I think, from Britian. They use the term synthetic phonics to refer to what we would call traditional phonics; letter sounds, blending, sounding out.

 

I know that Jolly Phonics (developed in the U.K.) is called a synthetic phonics program.

[Jumping In Puddles]

What you are doing is explicit phonics. Good Job! "a, I and the" are usually taught as sight words but you could tell him that when a vowel is alone it says it's name. "the" is a shortened and modernized version of "thee", which, you will notice, follows the rules.

 

Great, thanks. :)

 

What you're doing is good! Most homeschoolers are doing fine, a few get bought into the Doman teach your baby to read books or the Dolch Sight Words, here's how to teach the Dolch sight words phonetically and why not to teach them by sight:

 

http://www.thephonicspage.org/On%20Reading/sightwords.html

 

Thank you for the link!

 

How are got, not, hot sight words?

 

One more question - I see that on that page there are words like CAN and RAN. My son will look at the word as sound out "k" "ah" "n" but he can tell that it is the more subtle (with our accent) "k" "e" "n" (it's not quite kan or ken) but basically he is sounding it out and adjusting the accent. Is that why these are not "sight words"?

Edited December 24, 2008 by Jumping In Puddles

[ElizabethB]

How are got, not, hot sight words?

 

One more question - I see that on that page there are words like CAN and RAN. My son will look at the word as sound out "k" "ah" "n" but he can tell that it is the more subtle (with our accent) "k" "e" "n" (it's not quite kan or ken) but basically he is sounding it out and adjusting the accent. Is that why these are not "sight words"?

 

They are not true sight words! But, in the majority of the public schools here in the U.S., they are taught by sight as wholes. It is crazy, there is no good reason to teach got, hot, and not as sight words, and no research to back up their use. These 220 Dolch words are actually the most commonly used words in children's literature in the U.S. in the early 1900's, so they're actually most frequent words, not a true "sight word," which should be a word that is so phonetically irregular that you must teach it by sight.

 

They disguise this fact to parents by splitting up the words across grade levels and listing them alphabetically, then they send home a list that does not appear as phonetic at first glance.

 

Your "can/ken" question is one of the reasons why Webster's Speller is so powerful, there are slight differences in vowel sounds depending on the letter that follows the vowel, but each syllable is pronounced exactly as it is in a word. However, while Webster's is more effective, especially for someone with any kind of speech or hearing problems, the sounds are close enough that a normal student with a good phonics program will do fine and will learn to adjust the sounds accordingly.

 

The UK has its own similar problems, although the Dolch list isn't used as extensively, there is a lot of balanced literacy problems there, too, the Reading Reform Foundation (RRF) of the UK has a website to try to promote synthetic phonics:

 

http://www.rrf.org.uk/

 

In the U.S., there is a similar organization called the National Right to Read Foundation (NRRF.)

Edited December 24, 2008 by ElizabethB

[Jumping In Puddles]

However, while Webster's is more effective, especially for someone with any kind of speech or hearing problems, the sounds are close enough that a normal student with a good phonics program will do fine and will learn to adjust the sounds accordingly.

 

 

Thanks for all the information! At this point, I'm guessing my son is a normal student because he adjusts the sounds with ease (which really seems difficult to me and I am always a little surprised when he sounds out a new word and adjusts the accent) so I'm going to stick with my phonics program since I just ordered the dang thing! But I am going to study your pages and maybe try to incorporate the syllabary in the lessons if possible.

 

Thank you again for all the wonderful information!