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Comment by sarahconstantin | Hacker News Reader

I'm also confused here. Most definitions of "phonics" I've seen are just "teach kids how to connect written letters with speech sounds." What on earth would non-phonics reading instruction look like?

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The one method that become very popular in Brazil since the 80s is the "whole word" method. The child is supposed to memorize the form of the word instead of decoding it. No need to say that's not efficient (as the latin letters allow the sound/sign conversions), it overloads memory, and in the end, the child takes longer to learn. The standardized tests in Brazil show that.

Now, for why phonics and syllabic method had been replaced with the whole word method here in Brazil... that's another and long story.

EDIT 1: typo.

The "Look Say" method you describe (vs the classic "Phonics" method) was also widely deployed in the USA, to the detriment of many children's reading and writing skills.

I object to both.

The whole-word method is required for Chinese languages. Phonics is obviously proper for Spanish and Russian.

English is not so extreme. Phonics is useful, but it falls short. I've seen the disaster that is pure phonics with English, leading to a kid who mostly couldn't read at age 14. On the other hand, it will be hard to develop a decent vocabulary with the whole-word method. A hybrid approach works nicely.

See phonics fail on The Chaos: https://www.learnenglish.de/pronunciation/pronunciationpoem....

One part of the solution is to introduce exceptions early. The whole thing is a more complicated business than a one-to-one sound-letter correspondence. But it is a problem that has been solved for a long time now[1]. Cognitive science is not required. The only mystery is how this is not more widely known.

[1] teach your child to read in 100 easy lessons, and associated school curricula from the same author

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