Tell me why I should consider LOE...

[Sew happily ever after]

I have 6levels of AAS. And IEW PAL. Why should I switch to LOE? Is it phonics or sight words? Guess I'm having trouble wading through the information to find answers to my questions. Also what kind of child/ability is this for? Non-reader? Struggling reader? Anyone who wants to go thru it?

[deerforest]

If you have AAS and it is working for your family, I can't think of any reason to switch to LoE.

 

My daughter is an advanced reader but is not a natural speller. In fact, her spelling skills are quite asynchronous compared to her others on standardized testing (spelling at grade level and everything else well above).

 

AAS worked best when she was younger. We both liked the rules and O-G approach but the repetition and slowness soon felt like drudgery.

 

I researched a lot. I have WRTR, How to Teach Spelling, etc. I wanted an O-G approach that was structured yet not overly scripted. I wanted a variety of exercises. I wanted a workbook that didn't feel "workbooky". I wanted games and some fun.

 

So far we are really happy with LoE. It fits my criteria, but I have nothing to gain by convincing someone else it will work for them. It has a lot more writing than AAS which I like now especially with the cursive workbook.

 

I know many folks are adapting it for younger kids but my DD is a rising 3rd grader with probably at least a 5th or 6th grade reading level, and I feel like it is the perfect fit for her now but we would have had to tweak it a bit much if I had tried it a year ago.

 

I think there is a large range of students that will benefit from this curriculum.

[Tracy]

I use SWR, so I don't know how LOE compares to AAS. But I saw LOE at a recent conference, and I sat in on one of Denise Eide's presentation. It was my impression that LOE was much more superficial than SWR. It seemed to me that the strength of LOE was in the clarity with which it explained the rules and phonograms and the daily schedule of lessons. If you already feel that you have that in AAS, I don't see anything in LOE that you would want to spend your money on. Some people have commented that it is worth buying the book or games, though.

[deerforest]

Please share how you think it is superficial.

[Tracy]

Please share how you think it is superficial.

 

First, let me just make sure I emphasize that I did not say that LOE was superficial--just that it was more superficial than SWR. Keep in mind that I haven't used the program. I can only give anecdotal evidence.

 

In her presentation, Denise Eide was trying to demonstrate how the letter "A" can make three different sounds in seemingly similar words, as follows:

 

vacuum: "a" makes the short sound

vacate: the first "a" makes the long sound

vacation: the first "a" sounds like /ah/

 

I am not sure why she says that the first "a" in "vacation" says /ah/. Where I live, we use a long "a." Nevertheless, I don't think that it matters how it is pronounced regionally. By saying that the first "a" in "vacation says /ah/, she is creating two problems. First, she is creating an inconsistency with the rule that "A says its long sound at the end of a syllable (except if it is the last syllable)." Secondly, you lose the obvious connection between the words "vacate" and "vacation."

 

There are other examples, but this is the one that stands out to me the most.

 

In my mind, this demonstrates a more superficial teaching of the language than I see in SWR, however articulate Ms. Eide may be in sharing that understanding. There are lots of people out there that don't care about such details (and that is just what this is--a detail). But the consistency and the connections are what make me stick with SWR despite the difficulty of the manual.

[nansk]

I have 6levels of AAS. And IEW PAL. Tell me why I should consider LOE...

 

You shouldn't. I assume 6 levels of AAS is a complete spelling curriculum. If you still want more than what AAS teaches (advanced words and dictation, for instance) you would look at Spalding/SWR/How To Teach Spelling/Megawords.

Edited June 25, 2012 by nansk

[garddwr]

First, let me just make sure I emphasize that I did not say that LOE was superficial--just that it was more superficial than SWR. Keep in mind that I haven't used the program. I can only give anecdotal evidence.

 

In her presentation, Denise Eide was trying to demonstrate how the letter "A" can make three different sounds in seemingly similar words, as follows:

 

vacuum: "a" makes the short sound

vacate: the first "a" makes the long sound

vacation: the first "a" sounds like /ah/

 

I am not sure why she says that the first "a" in "vacation" says /ah/. Where I live, we use a long "a." Nevertheless, I don't think that it matters how it is pronounced regionally. By saying that the first "a" in "vacation says /ah/, she is creating two problems. First, she is creating an inconsistency with the rule that "A says its long sound at the end of a syllable (except if it is the last syllable)." Secondly, you lose the obvious connection between the words "vacate" and "vacation."

 

There are other examples, but this is the one that stands out to me the most.

 

In my mind, this demonstrates a more superficial teaching of the language than I see in SWR, however articulate Ms. Eide may be in sharing that understanding. There are lots of people out there that don't care about such details (and that is just what this is--a detail). But the consistency and the connections are what make me stick with SWR despite the difficulty of the manual.

 

How did Denise Eide explain the schwa sound at that beginning of vacation? That is the sound I use, and most of the people I know, although I have occasionally heard the word with a long a sound at the beginning. It also shows up in words like Pacific, manipulate, variety, malevolent, malignant, etc. Seems to me an unaccented a before an accented syllable becomes a schwa. How does SWR explain these pronunciations?

[Tracy]

How did Denise Eide explain the schwa sound at that beginning of vacation? That is the sound I use, and most of the people I know, although I have occasionally heard the word with a long a sound at the beginning. It also shows up in words like Pacific, manipulate, variety, malevolent, malignant, etc. Seems to me an unaccented a before an accented syllable becomes a schwa. How does SWR explain these pronunciations?

 

Ms. Eide did not address the schwa sound at all in "vacation." Instead, she just stated that it is pronounced as /ah/. And perhaps that is how people pronounce it where she lives.

 

SWR does address those schwa sounds and explains them much like you do above. Unaccented vowels commonly become a schwa sound in pronunciation. In those cases, we are taught to emphasize the true vowel sound as we "think to spell" that word. So if I were in an area that pronounces "vacation" with that schwa sound, I would explain it to my student like this.

 

We say vu - kay- shun, but we think vay - kay - shon.

 

Likewise, you would need to use a "think to spell" strategy for the other examples you give.

 

Pac - if - ic: We think to spell pas - if - ik (A has a short "a" sound)

 

man i pu late: We think to spell man - i - pu - layt (first A has a short "a" sound)

 

mal ev O lent: We think to spell mal - ev- o - lent (A has a short "a" sound and the "O" has a long sound because it is at the end of a syllable.)

 

mal ig nant: We think to spell mal - ig - nant (Both "A's" have a short "a" sound

 

var i et y: We think to spell var - I - et - i (the first "A" is part of a multi-letter phonogram, AR; the I is long because it is at the end of a syllable; the "Y" is thought of as a short "i" to maintain the strong I/Y connection and to avoid mispelling as "E" or "EE," etc.) A lot of people don't like the Y saying short "i," but I find the logic to be well founded, and more so as I progress through the program.

[Guest Denise Eide]

Tracy,

 

I have been monitoring the discussion on Well Trained Mind about LOE for sometime. As the author, I have not wanted to intervene because I have found it interesting to learn about what people think about the program etc. However, in this discussion there has been a misunderstanding that I think would be helpful to clarify.

 

First, I did not say that we can hear the short /a/ sound in vacation. Rather, I said that vacation is an example of a word where the A is saying the schwa sound. What is interesting to me, now that I have looked it up in a few dictionaries, is that some dictionaries mark it with a long /a/ sound and some mark it with the schwa sound. (So thank you for posting this because it helped me to dig deeper and to find a point of confusion for my audience.)

 

My point in sharing the words: vacate, vacuous, and vacation was to demonstrate the English is a morpho-phonemic language. What I mean by this is that English spelling seeks to find a balance in representing sound while preserving the spelling of roots. For this reason many phonograms will need to say more than one sound. The root vac means empty. It is found in the words above as well as in vacuum, evacuate...

 

When I teach words with a schwa sound, I tell students to exaggerate the vowel sound as it was explained by Tracy. I think this it is very important for students to create an "auditory picture" of the word as an additional memory hook for spelling. However, Logic of English also will teach students to consider roots that have related meanings. This is because many times by finding a related root word, the student can "discover" the spelling of the unaccented vowel sound.

 

Hear are a few examples:

 

In the word definition, the bold i is pronounced with a schwa. However be teaching students that this is a derivative of define, they can now hear the long /i/ sound clearly.

 

In the word pe des tri an the bold e is pronounced as a schwa. Yes, teach students to exaggerate the long /e/ sound for spelling purposes. However, do not leave it there. Also teach them that "ped" means foot. Find other words that use the same root such as pedal, peddler, biped, millipede, and others where the root is in an accented syllable and clearly heard. In this way students will have an additional memory hook for spelling but also begin to learn to look for roots to find the meaning of words.

 

Or as in the examples listed by Tracy:

 

Pacific: I agree exaggerate the A in /pa ci fic/, though I would encourage them to say a long /a/ sound because the syllable breaks after the A. However, I would also teach them the root "paci" means peace and relate it to the common derivatives pacifism and pacify - where the A's are clearly pronounced as a short /a/ because they are in the accented syllable. I would also tell students that Magellan named the ocean "peaceful" because he found it less stormy than the Atlantic. The goal here is to create an auditory picture by exaggerating the sounds and to demonstrate the relationship in meaning so that students have many hooks on which to hang both the meaning and spelling of words.

 

manipulate: We think to spell man - i - pu - layt (first A has a short "a" sound). I fully agree!

 

malevolent: I would encourage students to divide it like the dictionary: ma lev o lent. I too would tell them to exaggerate the long A and O for spelling purposes. However, I would not stop there. Mal is the root for "bad." I would encourage students to think of other words that use "mal" such as malicious, malady, malignant, malnutrition... and to find words where the A is clearly pronounced because the syllable is accented. We would also contrast it with benevolent. Volent means "wish." My goal is that students see both the way phonograms and spelling rules work together to illustrate the pronunciation of words and the way roots work together to contribute to the meaning of a word.)

 

malignant: We think to spell mal - ig - nant (Both "A's" have a short "a" sound) agreed!

 

variety: I will leave my comments off of this one, unless people want me to address my thoughts on Y saying the long /e/ sound.

 

By the way, the second edition of Uncovering the Logic of English will be out in July and it includes information about English as a morpho-phonemic language. As I learn from professional development classes I attend, I will pass the knowledge onto my readers. For me, discovering that English spelling is morpho-phonemic was as big of an ah-ha moment as discovering the rules and phonograms which govern English. I have always known that roots were vital, but it never occurred to me that they were an integral part of why English spelling appears to be so complex when only approached phonemically.

 

 

Cheers!

 

Denise Eide

 

author of Uncovering the Logic of English and the Essentials Curriculum!

Edited June 26, 2012 by Denise Eide

[garddwr]

Tracy,

 

I have been monitoring the discussion on Well Trained Mind about LOE for sometime. As the author, I have not wanted to intervene because I have found it interesting to learn about what people think about the program etc. However, in this discussion there has been a misunderstanding that I think would be helpful to clarify.

 

First, I did not say that we can hear the short /a/ sound in vacation. Rather, I said that vacation is an example of a word where the A is saying the schwa sound. What is interesting to me, now that I have looked it up in a few dictionaries, is that some dictionaries mark it with a long /a/ sound and some mark it with the schwa sound. (So thank you for posting this because it helped me to dig deeper and to find a point of confusion for my audience.)

 

My point in sharing the words: vacate, vacuous, and vacation was to demonstrate the English is a morpho-phonemic language. What I mean by this is that English spelling seeks to find a balance in representing sound while preserving the spelling of roots. For this reason many phonograms will need to say more than one sound. The root vac means empty. It is found in the words above as well as in vacuum, evacuate...

 

When I teach words with a schwa sound, I tell students to exaggerate the vowel sound as it was explained by Tracy. I think this it is very important for students to create an "auditory picture" of the word as an additional memory hook for spelling. However, Logic of English also will teach students to consider roots that have related meanings. This is because many times by finding a related root word, the student can "discover" the spelling of the unaccented vowel sound.

 

Hear are a few examples:

 

In the word definition, the bold i is pronounced with a schwa. However be teaching students that this is a derivative of define, they can now hear the long /i/ sound clearly.

 

In the word pe des tri an the bold e is pronounced as a schwa. Yes, teach students to exaggerate the long /e/ sound for spelling purposes. However, do not leave it there. Also teach them that "ped" means foot. Find other words that use the same root such as pedal, peddler, biped, millipede, and others where the root is in an accented syllable and clearly heard. In this way students will have an additional memory hook for spelling but also begin to learn to look for roots to find the meaning of words.

 

Or as in the examples listed by Tracy:

 

Pacific: I agree exaggerate the A in /pa ci fic/, though I would encourage them to say a long /a/ sound because the syllable breaks after the A. However, I would also teach them the root "paci" means peace and relate it to the common derivatives pacifism and pacify - where the A's are clearly pronounced as a short /a/ because they are in the accented syllable. I would also tell students that Magellan named the ocean "peaceful" because he found it less stormy than the Atlantic. The goal here is to create an auditory picture by exaggerating the sounds and to demonstrate the relationship in meaning so that students have many hooks on which to hang both the meaning and spelling of words.

 

manipulate: We think to spell man - i - pu - layt (first A has a short "a" sound). I fully agree!

 

malevolent: I would encourage students to divide it like the dictionary: ma lev o lent. I too would tell them to exaggerate the long A and O for spelling purposes. However, I would not stop there. Mal is the root for "bad." I would encourage students to think of other words that use "mal" such as malicious, malady, malignant, malnutrition... and to find words where the A is clearly pronounced because the syllable is accented. We would also contrast it with benevolent. Volent means "wish." My goal is that students see both the way phonograms and spelling rules work together to illustrate the pronunciation of words and the way roots work together to contribute to the meaning of a word.)

 

malignant: We think to spell mal - ig - nant (Both "A's" have a short "a" sound) agreed!

 

variety: I will leave my comments off of this one, unless people want me to address my thoughts on Y saying the long /e/ sound.

 

By the way, the second edition of Uncovering the Logic of English will be out in July and it includes information about English as a morpho-phonemic language. As I learn from professional development classes I attend, I will pass the knowledge onto my readers. For me, discovering that English spelling is morpho-phonemic was as big of an ah-ha moment as discovering the rules and phonograms which govern English. I have always known that roots were vital, but it never occurred to me that they were an integral part of why English spelling appears to be so complex when only approached phonemically.

 

 

Cheers!

 

Denise Eide

 

author of Uncovering the Logic of English and the Essentials Curriculum!

 

Thank you for the clarification, Denise. I have never heard the term morpho-phonemic, but it makes sense and I think is a good argument against the kind of spelling regularization some people argue for--mapping each phoneme to a single grapheme. Whatever you gained in spelling and reading simplicity would be lost in seeing the connections between words.

 

And out of curiosity, I would love to hear your thoughts on "y" making a long "e" sound. The words I can think of off the top of my head are all derived from French--variety, charity, clarity, sobriety, etc. and would be written with an accented e in that language--é or ée. Maybe we used a y to spell them in English because we can't use an accent sign to show that the e is not silent?

 

I'm glad you chimed in.

 

--Sarah

[kirstenhill]

Very interesting...thanks for sharing those thoughts, Denise!

[prairiegirl]

To the OP, if what you have is working then you shouldn't switch, there is no reason for that. I have a struggling reader and what we were using was not working for us. So far, LoE is working very well for us. But I would never have switched if we weren't spinning our wheels with previous curriculum.

[Guest Denise Eide]

I would be glad to explain why I teach Y with four sounds. However, before I do I want to make it clear that the programs that do not teach the long /ē/ sound are still great programs. This is not a make-it-or-break-it point. Rather it is one way of systematizing the linguistic structure of English.

 

More than sixty percent of students in the U.S. read below grade level. Almost 50% of adults are functionally illiterate. All of the programs that teach phonograms and spelling rules and break down the linguistic structure of English are strong. My point is not to say I am right, my point is to say this is what makes the most sense to me. We need a variety of programs out there that address reading and spelling systematically. There is an enormous need for strong reading materials and I do not want people to circle the wagon on this issue or to use my words to bash another program.

 

So that said, here is why I teach Y to say four sounds /y-ĭ-ī-ē/:

 

I will begin with a short linguistics lesson to provide background.

 

Long /e/ and short /ĭ/ are a tense and lax vowel pair. What this means is that if you say long /ē/ and then say short /ĭ/ you will notice your mouth is in a similar position. What is different between the sounds is that the cheeks pull back and become tenser to say the long /ē/ sound and move forward into a more relaxed position to say the short /ĭ/ sound. If you sustain the sound as you slowly change the position make your mouth more tense and more lax you will discover there are actually an infinite number of vowels sounds between the short /ĭ/ and long /ē/ sound. And in fact some languages actually use those sounds to distinguish meaning. One example of this is Russian which has a hard and soft long /ē/ sound. To native English speakers these two vowels are indistinguishable. However, we do distinguish between short /ĭ/ and long /ē/.

 

It is also important to know that I and Y are related in English and that I says the same four sounds: /ĭ-ī-ē-y/ (it, ivy, stadium, onion) In fact in many Latin root words the I is says the long /e/ sound. This is because in Latin, as in most languages, I actually represents the long /ē/ sound. English, however, went through a vowel shift where the pronunciation of vowels changed and therefore we use the I to represent the short /ĭ/ sound in many native English and Germanic words. However, as I mentioned above, the I does say the long /ē/ sound in Latin roots such as:

piano, geranium, radius... (There is even a rule about when I will say the long /e/ sound. I says long /e/ at the end of a syllable before another vowel.)

 

 

 

Now for the reasons I teach Y with a long /e/ sound.

 

1) I and Y are clearly related in that they share the same sounds including the long /e/ sound. I have no problem adding the sound when I also says long /e/.

 

2) For several years I taught both students and teachers to "say to spell" short /i/ for the Y at the end of words. What I found was that this was a very difficult concept for many teachers. It actually became a barrier to some teachers for teaching phonics. And it was very difficult for students with auditory processing difficulties. With these students I would work hard on teaching them to separate sounds into words and to listen for the sounds. They all clearly heard a long /e/ sound at the end of words such as baby, clearly, ready... And because there was not a long /e/ sound with the Y they would write it with an E or an EE.

 

3) So I began to do some linguistics research. What I discovered is that there are only four ways to spell the long E sound at the end of words:

E, EE, EA, and Y.

 

If we hear a long /e/ at the end of a one syllable word it will always be E. However there are only nine of them.

he she we

the me be

 

Single letter E also spells the long /e/ sound at the end of a few multi-syllable words. But there are only ten.

 

acne adobe apostrophe catastrophe

coyote epitome kamikaze karate

recipe simile

 

EA spells the long E sound at the end of nine words. Eight of which are one syllable.

flea pea plea

sea tea guinea

 

And EE spells the long /e/ sound at the end of fifteen words. Notice all these words have only one syllable.

bee fee flee free

glee knee pee see

spree tee thee three

tree

 

Y, however, spells the long E sound at the end of more than 10,000 words. In addition all of these words have more than one syllable. Because when Y is at the end of a one syllable word it will always say the long /i/ sound. And in case you are interested here is the list of all seventeen:

by buy cry dry

fly fry my ply

pry shy sky sly

spry sty try why

wry

 

Therefore, it seemed to be simpler to teach my students that when they hear the long /e/ sound at the end of a multi-syllable word it is spelled with a Y, unless it is one of the ten listed above. It does not relate to the rule that English words do not end in I. However, it is just as simple and it still ties together the sounds of I and Y.

 

I hope this helps.

 

Onward!

 

Denise Eide