Why choose The Phonic English Text Reading Method?
What is the phonetic method?
The phonetic method, invented in the United States, tries to make up for the defects of the alphabet by replacing it, for the teaching of reading, with a special alphabet, where each sign has a fixed value.
In this method the students are told the common sounds of various letters, instead of their names. Then these sounds are combined to form words. The words to be taught at the early stage are those with more or less regular spellings, e.g. hat, mat, rat, etc.
This method has been acclaimed on the following ground:
Teaching phonics can benefit students’ overall pronunciation, basic understanding of the language, and their long-term communication skills. Plus, it will make them better readers and writers, helping them communicate their points of view effectively. Phonics education also makes learning a fun and effective process.
Phonics is considered a “bottom-up” approach in which students “decode” the meaning of a text. The advantage of phonics, especially for students who attend schools with large vocabularies, is that once they have mastered the basics, they can go to the library and read a wide variety of children’s literature.
This method has been criticized on the following grounds:
1. In English the forms of various letters don`t invariably correspond to the sounds represented by them. Hence phonic method isn`t suitable for teaching English.
2. All the words can`t be taught by this method. There are a large number of words in English which have silent letters, e.g. dumb, doubt, etc.
3. As in this method the letter is the unit of reading, this retarded the speed of reading.
4. Phonic method makes use of unusual vocabulary, e.g. nag is used for horse. As Danville say, “The words of the early lesson are selected because of their phonetic spelling and the consequent ease with which they can be manipulated on phonic lines. But these words are neither the most interest nor common words of ordinary speech”
