http://nifdi.org/news-latest-2/blog-hem ... y-problems
The description above is attributed to a 'whole language' regime where there is no explicit systematic phonics teaching.In the early school years, books usually employ highly predictable language and usually offer pictures to aid word identification. This combination can provide an appearance of early literacy progress. The hope in this approach is that this form of multi-cue reading will beget skilled reading.
However, the problem of decoding unfamiliar words is merely postponed by such attractive crutches. It is anticipated in the meaning centred approach that a self-directed attention to word similarities will provide a generative strategy for these students. However, such expectations are all too frequently dashed – for many at-risk children progress comes to an abrupt halt around Year 3 or 4 when an overwhelming number of unfamiliar (in written form) words are rapidly introduced. This apparent stalling of progress became known as the fourth grade slump (Chall & Jacobs, 1983; Hirsch, 2003). The number of words a child requires to cope with grade level text in Year 2 was estimated by Carnine (1982) as between three and four hundred, and in Years 3 and 4 between three and four thousand. Share (1995) estimated that the average fifth year student encounters about ten thousand new words – an “orthographic avalanche” that overwhelms most of those without adequate decoding skills.
Strategies that rely upon memory-for-shapes of words, or picture-clues, or context-clues become unproductive (Spear-Swerling & Sternberg, 1994). This leaves a dependence largely on the students’ visual-recognition store of word shapes, and students too often have not developed any generative strategy for the decoding of these novel words. It is true that some children develop a working understanding of the alphabetic principle despite the absence of explicit instruction; however, those students who did not have the ‘Aha!’ experience tended to be left floundering without the structure necessary to progress (National Reading Panel, 2000). This circumstance often becomes apparent during fourth grade (though with appropriate assessment, the problem could have been uncovered in the first grade).
It is not uncommon, however, to see children reach a 'slump' in their reading capacity in England where there is an official systematic synthetic phonics regime.
It is noted that many teachers may still promote multi-cueing reading strategies alongside their phonics provision - and I have seen a number of children who have a reasonable grasp of a 'simple code' which equates to the alphabetic code knowledge taught in Reception (for the 4 to 5 year olds) but they do not have a grasp of the 'complex' or 'extended' alphabetic code.
This means that they are not able to apply the blending skill successfully - or do not bother to apply it at all - when words contain letter/s-sound correspondences that they do not know.
The temptation then is to apply a 'guess' usually a word that may appear to 'make sense' and a word from their own oral vocabulary.
What happens, however, when the unknown word is not in the spoken language of the learner - and when the word contains letter/s-sound correspondences that are not known by the learner?
What kind the learner call upon in this set of circumstances?
The level of reading material as it becomes more challenging over time - with increasing numbers of words never previously read by the learner and not in the learner's vocabulary presents a nightmare scenario.
Any read-aloud activities are a threat to the learner's self-esteem and very stressful.
The learner thinks that he or she is not as intelligent as peers doing so much better with their reading.
Reading becomes increasingly less-appealing - and the learner has to skip more and more words when reading silently.
Here in England, many organisations are grouping together for a campaign of getting all children reading by 2025 - but there is little mention, or little apparent understanding, of the alphabetic code knowledge gap that can destroy learners' reading progress and future life-chances.
Much of the campaign is about getting parents talking and reading with their children - nothing based on an analysis of the 'slump' described by Kempenstall and which is common even in countries where phonics has been promoted for some years.
Here in England parents tell us how they know their children's teachers are still promoting multi-cueing reading strategies and giving their children reading books to read which they cannot read without at least some guessing.
