Xaphan Ukobach Furies
...when a man's fancy gets astride on his reason, when imagination is at cuffs with his senses, and common understanding as well as common sense, is kicked out of doors, the first proselyte he makes is himself... [Jonathan Swift. A tale of a tub. 1704]
21 Neither repented they of their murders, nor of their sorceries, nor of their fornication, nor of their thefts. [The Revelation of St. John The Divine, 9: 20 and 21]
Revolutionaries generally promise heaven and deliver hell.
The bizarre fantasies of whole languagists have for two decades controlled how reading is defined and taught in schools, how reading failure is understood and handled, and how reading teachers are trained and certified. The product of their self-assuring efforts is millions of semi-illiterate students who after 12 years in school still struggle to read the written word, spell, write, and comprehend text. They are therefore semi-illiterate in all subjects that require proficient reading.
Whole language promised a revolution and it delivered. Instead of teaching, teachers coached. Instead of learning, children guessed. Instead of mastering, children failed. Instead of growing, children were stunted. Instead of leaving school proudly, students dropped out early or left demoralized. All under the banner of This is Good For You.
Of course, whole language did not do all this by itself. It had
support from its ideological brothers--fuzziest math, multi-culty social studies, trivialized
"new speak" history, literature without Shakespeare, and portfolio
assessment (scrapbooks). All these monstrosities grew in the infected womb of "progressivism" (child-centered, learning-should-be-fun,
let students select the curriculum), fed by Romantic
modernism, postmodernism, and the 60’s new-left critique of western social institutions and resistance to external authority (rules for
right reasoning, bodies of knowledge, and the historic role of teacher)--all
under the leadership of self-appointed gurus, fake savants, and secular edupriests, who mistake their flatulent eructations as the voice of God.
Even a cursory reading of some of the main tenets of whole language reveals them to be so stupid, so contrary to common observation, so easily seen as the product of mental derangement, that one wonders how whole language caught on--unless one assumes that followers are equally stupid and deranged.
Another explanation is that the founders of whole language disguised the essential egoism and insanity of their "project" behind appealing phrases embedded in logical fallacies not seen by the unwary.
Goodman's Guessing Game
Whole language proponents cite Kenneth
Goodman's 1967 paper ("Reading: A psycholinguistic guessing game") as
one of the first in their canon--the paper that fostered the whole language
movement, or revolution (Goodman, 1976) and continues to guide and legitimize
whole language activities (Pappas & Pettegrew, 1998). Goodman clearly saw
the paper the same way--as offering "a more viable scientific
alternative" to what he dubbed "pre-existing, naive, common sense
notions" about reading that "interfere with the application of modern
scientific concepts of language and thought to research on reading"
(Goodman, 1967, p. 126).
Let's take Goodman at his word. Let's examine his "more viable scientific alternative" to see how he crafted a new foundation for reading research and instruction; to determine whether it satisfies the criteria for a viable or even scientific alternative; and to understand better how his ideas were so easily accepted and spawned the whole language movement.
8 And I looked, and behold a pale horse: and his name that sat on him was Death, and Hell followed with him. [The Revelation of St. John The Divine, 6:7 and 8]
In simplest terms, Goodman presents a conception of reading as a guessing game. He provides no logical, empirical, or commonsensical support for this conception. He then presents a highly selective set of passage misreadings by a child. These misreadings are not called errors; they are "miscues." These misreadings are interpreted in a way that fits Goodman's guessing-game formulation (although other interpretations--from the phonics approach that he disparages--are more obvious and more reasonable). Goodman then uses the misreading examples to verify his conception of reading--although the only credible use of the examples would be a demonstration that it is possible to misinterpret misreadings that way. The paper ends with the implication for instruction; namely, teach children to play the guessing game more skillfully.
The Opening Gambit
Goodman's paper begins with a
common rhetorical device--caricature of a self-created adversary.
Specifically, he creates a false binary opposition of then current conceptions
of reading and their associated methods of teaching: "phonic centered"
and "word centered." He reduces these approaches to a few
statements that would lead readers to agree with Goodman that these conceptions
are simplistic and must be wrong. For example,
"...the common sense notion I seek here to refute is this: Reading is a precise process. It involves exact, detailed, sequential perception and identification of letters, words, spelling patterns and larger language units.' In phonic centered approaches to reading, the preoccupation is with precise letter identification. In word centered approaches, the focus is on word identification... (p. 126).
Goodman then writes, "In place of this misconception, I offer this..."--his allegedly "more viable scientific alternative" foreshadowed in the paper's abstract. Note the artful way that Goodman sets up the reader.
1. He labels in a disparaging way the phonic and word centered approaches "common sense notions," despite the great deal of scientific research done in support of each one--especially the approach that advocated teaching phonics in a systematic way during beginning reading. Yet, he does not cite this research or even hint that there was any. These approaches are not presented as bodies of knowledge that may have some flaws. Rather, in contrast to his self-valorized "scientific alternative," readers are simply to take Goodman's unsupported word and consider them mere common sense notions.
2. In contrast to
standard practice in science, Goodman presents no data that the phonic and word
centered approaches do not work. He conducts no experiments--indeed, he
cites no research at all--showing that whole language instruction (derived from
his guessing game formulation of reading) is more effective than the
phonic centered and word centered approaches he wishes to replace. And,
although he calls them "misconceptions," he does not analyze the
intellectual apparatus behind the phonic centered and word centered approaches
(e.g., their theories of reading) to show they are logically flawed.
In other words, Goodman does nothing to (in his own words)
"refute" these common sense notions. His only claim to readers'
attention--and the only warrant for his "scientific" alternative--is
an unsubstantiated opening pitch that there are two pre-existing alternatives;
that these alternatives are merely common sense notions; and that they are
misconceptions.
The New Model
Goodman then presents his
"scientific" alternative.
"...I offer this: Reading is a selective process. It involves partial use of available minimal language cues [Notice that he does not call them "reading" cues. This makes it possible to falsely conflate reading and language, so that he can argue for teaching reading the same--incidental, "natural"--way that language is ordinarily learned. PP] selected from perceptual input on the basis of the reader's expectation. As this partial information is processed, tentative decisions are made to be confirmed, rejected, or refined as reading progresses....More simply stated, reading is a psycholinguistic guessing game. It involves an interaction between thought and language. Efficient reading does not result from precise perception and identification of all the elements, but from skill in selecting the fewest, most productive cues necessary to produce guesses which are right the first time. The ability to anticipate that which will be seen, of course, is vital in reading, just as the ability to anticipate what has not yet been heard is vital in listening (pp. 127-8).
Notice that there are at least three logical errors in
Goodman's opening presentation of his new and "scientific" approach
to reading. First, Goodman's new view of reading rests on the fallacy
of reification. He transforms what is merely a metaphor into a concrete
reality. Goodman does not say that reading can (metaphorically) be seen
(for purposes of analysis) as if it were a psycholinguistic guessing
game. Rather, reading is a psycholinguistic guessing game. It is
not as if readers are guessing at what words say. Readers actually are
guessing. [The author asks readers of this document to consider whether
they are in fact guessing at every word on this page.] However, treating
a metaphor as a concrete reality was a useful trick. It means that
whole language rests on a fantasy--a dreamy way of thinking--in which there is
no boundary between how we think about things and how things actually are.
Once new teachers are seduced into this dream world, almost any bizarre and
baseless statements can be taken as sage wisdom.
Second, Goodman commits the fallacy of hyperbole, or over-generalization. He does not say that reading is a psycholinguistic guessing game for certain aspects of reading, for some readers, at some point in their learning to read. Rather, all of reading is a guessing game for all readers all the time. This rhetorical device enables Goodman to lay claim to all of reading and reading instruction (word recognition, spelling, writing)--and to call it whole language.
Third, Goodman's definition of reading
commits the fallacy of tautology. After stating (above) that reading is a
psycholinguistic guessing game, Goodman states, "It involves an
interaction between thought and language." [It is interesting that
Goodman's definition of reading does not even have the word print in it.]
Apparently, the statement ("It involves an interaction between thought and
language.") is supposed to support the idea that reading is a
psycholinguistic guessing game. However, interaction between thought and
language means exactly the same thing as psycholinguistic. Therefore, all
Goodman is saying is that reading is a guessing game that involves interaction
between thought and language. [Again, nothing about print.]
However, all thinking uses language. Thinking means
talking to yourself--in a language. So, what could an interaction between
thinking (which means talking to yourself) and language mean? In summary,
Goodman's new definition of reading is empty. It means nothing at
all, and it certainly has nothing to do with interacting with the printed
word--the ordinary conception of reading. Goodman's full conception consists of
the following propositions--taken from his initial statement (above) and from
the summary of his "model" at the end of the paper.
1. "Efficient reading does not result from precise
perception and identification of all the elements."
2. Reading "involves an interaction between thought and language."
3. "Reading is a selective process."
4. This selecting process "involves partial use of
available minimal language cues..."
5. Efficient reading results "from skill in selecting
the fewest, most productive cues..."
6. These cues are at first graphic cues (p. 135).
7. These cues are "selected from perceptual input on
the basis of the reader's expectation." They are "guided by
constraints set up through prior choices, his language knowledge, his cognitive
styles and strategies he has learned" (p. 135).
8. These cues provide "partial information."
9. The reader "forms a perceptual image using these
cues and his anticipated cues" (p. 135).
10. The reader "searches his memory for related
syntactic, semantic, and phonological cues."
11. This memory search "may lead to selection of more
graphic cues and to reforming the perceptual image" (p. 135).
12. These cues are "necessary to produce guesses which
are right the first time."
13. The reader then "makes a guess or tentative choice
consistent with graphic cues. Semantic analysis leads to partial decoding
as far as possible" (p. 135).
14. This partial information " processed, tentative
decisions are made to be confirmed, rejected, or refined as reading
progresses."
15. "If no guess is possible, he checks the recalled
perceptual input and tries again" (p. 135).
16. "If a guess is still not possible, he takes another
look at the text to gather more graphic cues" (p. 135).
17. "If the tentative choice is not acceptable
semantically or syntactically, then he regresses, scanning from right to left
along the line and up the page to locate a point of semantic or syntactic
inconsistency" (p. 135).
18. "When such a point is found, he starts over
at that point" (p. 135).
19. "If no inconsistency can be identified, he reads on
seeking some cue which will make it possible to reconcile the anamolous (sic)
situation" (p. 135).
20. "If the choice is acceptable, decoding
extended, meaning is assimilated with prior meaning and prior meaning
accommodated, if necessary" (p. 135).
21. "Then the cycle continues" (p. 135).
22. The above propositions enable one to see reading as a "psycholinguistic guessing game."
Rhetorical Devices and More Logical Fallacies in Goodman's Guessing Game
Goodman's new conception of reading is unsatisfactory in several ways.
It is speculation, not science.
A defining feature of science (in contrast to metaphysics, opinion, fantasy, and madness) is that propositions, arguments, theories, and conceptual schemes are judged viable and scientific not because proponents say so, but on the basic of empirical evidence and sound reasoning. Science also requires that writers define terms--especially when terms are new or may be misunderstood. However, Goodman's version of science--at least in his article--appears not to require any empirical evidence or effort at clear definition. He offers no data whatever to support his assertions that, for example,
1. Reading does not result from "precise perception and identification of all the elements."
2. Readers "select" "productive cues," and then guess at what words say and mean.
3. "Readers utilize not one, but three kinds of information simultaneously" (p. 131).
Nor does he explicate the meaning of "cue," "guess," "thought," "language," or even "reading."
The absence of evidence and clear definition weakens Goodman's claim that he offers a viable scientific alternative conception of reading. Still, Goodman managed to help fashion a new definition of science--a science with neither data nor reasoning nor defined concepts, a science indistinguishable from speculation and wishful thinking. However, this revisionist science well-served later whole language teachers, writers, researchers, and advocates who (guided by Goodman) no longer felt obliged to abide by--or even accept the legitimacy of--traditional scientific rules about external verification of claims via tests available to other persons (Moats, 2000). In the absence of empirical evidence, we can only assess the adequacy of Goodman's new guessing game conception of reading by examining the logical adequacy of his propositions, as shown below.
Goodman's conception of reading commits the fallacy of hasty
generalization, or converse accident. Goodman’s paper implies that his new
conception embraces all of reading. He does not say that only certain
elements of reading, at some times, for some readers are part of a guessing
game. Rather, "(R)eading a psycholinguistic guessing
game." It is for all readers a process of selecting cues, and then
guessing, confirming, rejecting, or refining tentative decisions about what
sounds letters make, what a word says and means, what a period and comma imply,
how words are spelled. However, such guessing, cue-selecting, and
decision-making arguably apply only to
(1) Beginning readers.
(2) Older readers who have not been taught to read and
understand text based on solid knowledge (and the automatic application) of
sound/symbol correspondence, punctuation, spelling, subject/predicate,
cause/effect, and so forth.
(3) Skilled readers who have run into a new and difficult
word.
Consider propositions 13-21 above. Is it reasonable to
assert that these activities apply to all readers? Is there any evidence
that skilled readers guess at every word--as if reading (fluent reading) were a
series of tentative choices?
Another example of hasty generalization is Goodman's use of
reading errors--called "miscues"--as the only evidence that all
reading is guessing. Goodman’s paper does not provide samples of fluent
reading to substantiate his propositions about selecting and guessing. This may
be because fluent reading provides no evidence of guessing. In summary,
it is likely that Goodman's guessing game conception of reading applies only to
poor readers, beginning readers, or good readers who are decoding unfamiliar
words. In other words, all that is new in Goodman’s new conception is the
unwarranted generalization that all readers guess all the time.
The massive irony, here, is that Goodman's followers created
a method of reading instruction--whole language--that reversed the polarity of
guessing. Rather than something to be overcome because it signified lack
of skill, guessing was now considered a natural and good thing, and therefore
was to be encouraged. Systematic instruction on phonemic awareness,
sound/symbol relationships (m says mmm), word attack, and spelling was now unnatural--a
bad thing to be discouraged. Whole language teachers therefore explicitly and
systematically taught new readers the guessing strategy used by poor readers
for making errors, and called it fine.
Goodman's Conception of Reading as a Guessing Game Commits the Fallacy of Reification, or Hypostatization. In other words, Goodman treats abstract terms ("reconcile the anamolous [sic] situation," assimilation, accommodation) and metaphoric fictions ("searches his memory for…cues," "he checks the recalled perceptual input") as if they were concrete objects or events (Thompson, 1995).
Recall that Goodman's new
formulation hinges on rejection of the "common sense" notions that
(1) reading involves an almost instantaneous recognition of whole words, or (2)
reading involves an almost automatic "perception and identification of
letters, words..." Note that whole word and phonic processes are
ordinary, readily observable, mundane actions. The reader sees and
properly or improperly identifies letters and words. Most observable
identification errors have straightforward, ordinary, mundane implications for
instruction; e.g., at sounding out words. But Goodman will offer nothing
attractive to potential followers unless he conjures a radical shift of reading
from the mundane to the esoteric. Something as commonsensical as mere
skill instruction will not do. Henceforth, reading processes and reading
instruction will no longer be easily seeable and teachable. Instead,
reading processes will be located in the mind: reading will involve "an
interaction between thought and language." Goodman now invents a
mental apparatus to account for reading skill and error--the psycholinguistic
guessing game--and it consists of selecting, deciding, guessing, confirming,
rejecting, and refining.
There are two logical problems with Goodman's reified mental
guessing game apparatus. First, in contrast to what we ordinarily expect
of a viable scientific account, there is no way to test whether Goodman's
hypothesized mental apparatus exists at all---i.e., whether readers in fact
perform the elaborate guessing routine--or whether the hypothesized apparatus
operates just as Goodman proposes. After all, many models of thought
processes can be generated to account for the same reading behavior--just as
demonic possession once provided a coherent account of psychiatric symptoms.
Second, Goodman transforms similes and metaphors (as-if) into objects--thought processes. However, all anyone (with a scientific orientation) can reasonably say about a fluent reader's performance is, "Her eyes scan the words and she speaks them as written." And all anyone can say about a struggling reader's halting, error-filled performance is, "It is as if she is guessing."
Yet,
Goodman's "scientific" formulation would have us believe that readers
(skilled and unskilled) actually see words, select cues, make a guess, check
the guess, reject the guess, make another guess, confirm the guess, and then
say the word correctly or incorrectly. If the guessing game is not a
convenient fiction enabling Goodman to make sense of reading, but is considered
a reality--something really happening--then a reader enacting the
psycholinguistic guessing algorithm (propositions 5-20 above) would be carrying
on an elaborate internal dialogue, as follows.
"James said...Hmmm, that t h looks like it might be
there. Okay, I'll say there....There lion...Wait... That doesn't
work. Okay, I'll try them...Them lion.... Nope...Maybe its this...This
lion...Yeah, that sounds right. This lion..."
But we rarely see anything like this guessing process. Even when readers make a high rate of errors, reading is so fast it is hard to imagine that somewhere in their subvocal thinking they perform the mental guess work. The only thing available to the observer of the above reading sample is the reader saying, "James said, (three-second pause) This lion."
Which is the more reasonable account of the three-second gap
between "said" and "This" (and every other error or pause
in a passage)? (1) The reader naturally (with no instruction) repeatedly
enacts multi-step guessing routines in milli-seconds, or (2) The reader simply
needs someone to tell her, "That word is this...Spell this.... t h i s...What
word?.... this.. Good. Start the line again...James said, This lion
is big."
In other words, Goodman's psycholinguistic apparatus (which,
for science, would be considered reified fictions, or hypothetical constructs)
is either: (1) incapable of any sort of test; and/or (2) simply impossible as
an actual activity in real time. At best, his psycholinguistic guessing
game can only be treated as a metaphor—in which case one asks if a metaphor is
the right foundation for nationwide reading assessment and instruction.
Whole Language and Upward Mobility
Goodman's hypothetical multi-step
mental guessing apparatus continues to have strong appeal. As
mentioned, Goodman helped to move reading and reading instruction out of the
mundane world of common, observable skills and into the world of
esoterica. Even simple decoding of text was now a complex mental activity
involving higher order thought processes such as selecting, testing, confirming,
and revising. Reading instruction would now require special skills giving
teachers access to the realm of thought where the hypothesized higher order
guessing game was played. Special courses, textbooks, conferences, and
education professors would be needed.
In other words, Goodman was not merely offering an
alternative to the phonic centered and word centered approaches. He was
creating an invidious status distinction. He was offering prestige. This
may have been appealing to education professors long known to occupy positions
of low status and prestige in the university community, and to school teachers
whose long hours, lack of appreciation, and low salary also connoted low status
and prestige. By making reading and reading instruction esoteric processes,
Goodman's paper helped foster the idea that traditional reading instruction was
only for commonsense-minded technicians interested in observable skill.
Whole language teachers and professors would be much more than this; they would
be theoreticians--certainly a higher class of people. This clarifies the
facile denigration of systematic instruction, planned practice, teaching
formats, field tested materials, scripted lesson plans, mastery tests, and in
general accountability by whole language teachers and education
professors. Reading instruction was to be an art; and the reading teacher
an artiste.
The "contemplatives" are a hundred times worse: I
know of nothing that excites such disgust as this kind of "objective"
arm-chair scholar, this kind of scented voluptuary of history, half person,
half satyr, perfume by Renan, who betrays immediately with the high falsetto of
his applause what he lacks, where he lacks it, where in this case the Fates
have applied their cruel shears with, alas, such surgical skill! [Nietzsche. The
genealogy of morals. Third essay, section 26]
Miscue Analysis and the Quasi-therapeutic
As noted earlier, the only empirical
evidence that Goodman presents in support of (as examples of) his guessing-game
model are reading errors made by children. Goodman calls these errors
"miscues in order to avoid value implications" (p. 127). For
example, the story text reads,
"So, education was good! I opened the dictionary
and picked out a word that sounded good. 'Philosophical'. I
yelled. Might as well study word meanings first. 'Philosophical:
showing calmness and courage in the face of ill fortune. "
What the child read was,
"So, education was good! I hoped a dictionary and
picked out a word that sounds good. PH He yelled. Might as
well study what it means. Phizo Phiso/soophical : showing calmness
and courage in his face of ill fort future futshion."
Goodman states, "His expected (i.e., correct. PP) responses mask the process of their attainment (That is, how he read correctly. PP), but his unexpected responses (i.e., errors, or miscues PP) have been achieved through the same process, albeit less successfully applied" (p. 127).
This is a very interesting
statement. Goodman is saying that when readers are fluent, we do not see
how they do it; i.e., we do not see any guessing game. It is only when
they err that we can make a case for guessing. And then, with no
rationale at all, Goodman states that reading well and making errors are done
via the same process. How could he possibly know that?
But as to incorrect reading itself, Goodman still has no direct, empirical evidence of guessing or any other activity in the elaborate guessing game apparatus. He does not ask readers to, for example, say outloud what they are doing as they try to read. All he has are interpretations of alleged covert guessing processes. Goodman's interpretations (miscue analysis) reveal that he is willing to avoid the most obvious interpretation of errors in favor of the guessing hypothesis. For example, Goodman says, "The substitution of hoped for opened could again be regarded as careless or imprecise identification of letters. But if we dig beyond this common sense explanation, we find (a) both are verbs (b) the words have key graphic similarities. Further, there may be evidence of the reader's bilingual French-Canadian background here, as there is in subsequent miscues (harms for arms; shuckled for chuckled, shoose for choose, shair for chair)" (p. 128).
[Mere delerium.]
Despite Goodman's efforts to make these errors fodder for armchair psychoanalysis, these
errors are nothing more than examples of the "imprecise identification of
letters"--and this imprecision rests very much on the child's lack of
sufficient instruction on how to sound out familiar and unfamiliar words based
on knowledge of sound/symbol correspondence. Goodman goes
out of his way to avoid the obvious account of reading errors--the child has
not been taught word attack skills--so that Goodman can "dig beyond"
the obvious and provide a more interesting guessing game interpretation for
which there is not a shred of direct evidence--not when persons read well and
not even when they make errors.
In summary, Goodman uses miscues as a resource for making
interpretations about thought processes in a way that suits his guessing game
model. There is nothing in the miscues themselves that suggests anything about
thought processes. But there is everything in the miscues that points
directly at poor instruction. Ironically, if Goodman's approach were in
fact scientific, he would provide a panel of impartial observers with a set of
miscue examples and ask the panel to make sense of each error or miscue, and
then compare his interpretation with theirs. In this way he could determine
the reliability of his interpretations.
Goodman's Entire Guessing Game Model Commits the Fallacy of Affirming the Consequent.
Goodman began his paper with the
claim that his model would be an example of science--not mere common
sense. However, his argument commits perhaps the most fundamental error
that the scientific method is devised to avoid; namely, the fallacy of
affirming the consequent. This fallacy can be depicted as follows.
If P,
then Q
Q (Affirming the
consequent)
_____________________________
Therefore P
For example,
If
there is frustration, then there will be aggression.
There is aggression.
____________________________
Therefore, there was
frustration.
The logical problem is that aggression may be the result of
many things besides frustration. That is why scientific researchers try
to identify alternative explanations (e.g., models of aggressive behavior,
reinforcement for aggressive behavior, a history of physical abuse) and see if
these alternatives can be disproved--leaving the original proposition (If
frustration, then aggression) intact for the time being.
Goodman's argument can be summarized as follows.
If reading
is a psycholinguistic guessing game, then readers will make certain kinds
of errors--miscues.
Readers
do make these kinds of errors--miscues.
_____________________________________________
Therefore, reading
is a psycholinguistic guessing game.
Seductive, isn't it? But is there NO other reason (besides
reading being a guessing game) why readers make guessing errors?
Let's see.
I have pointed out that miscues themselves are not direct
evidence of any mental guessing game activity. Goodman has simply
interpreted them that way. And there is no way to "dig" into
anyone's thought processes to determine whether Goodman is right or
wrong. Even so, there are other explanations for these miscues besides an
hypothesized mental guessing game.
The strongest candidate alternative is poor instruction.
At least that is a plausible rival explanation (Hempenstall, 1999). A
student makes half a dozen errors trying to sound out "philosophical"
because he was not taught exactly how to sound it out. He is not
firm on each letter/sound combination; he is not firm on sounding out a letter
or blend, holding the sound and scanning the word for the next letter or
blend. He says hoped" instead of "opened" because,
again, he is not firm on the sounding out strategy, and because he has not had
a teacher who systematically juxtaposed similar looking
words--hoped/opened--and demonstrated again and again that they are sounded out
differently.
In summary, it may be that many reading errors are not the
result of guessing--as some sort of natural process--but are taught. A
student reads a passage and says "fort" rather than
"fortune." The teacher simply (and improperly) tells
the student, "fortune." The student repeats "fortune"
and goes on with the passage--never really learning to sound out the difficult
word. Predictably, when the student sees "fortune" again, she
says "fort"--because that is what she has "practiced" so
many times before. Or, when the student says "fort" rather than
"fortune," the whole language teacher tells the student to think of a
word that might go there--in other words, the teacher encourages guessing.
The student casts about and tries "future" and
"futshion." Predictably, when the student runs into
"philosophical," the student will not sound out the word, but will do
as she was taught--she will cast about for likely
possibilities--"phizzo," "physical,"
"physicacol." In other words, the student's errors do not
reflect a natural guessing game apparatus. They are direct effects of
explicit (mal)instruction on guessing and failure to receive proper instruction
on how to sound out words.
The scientific test of the above rival hypothesis--Errors
represent how students are mistaught; they do not represent an innate guessing
game--is relatively easy to perform. Identify the sorts of errors
made by students taught with whole language vs. the sorts of errors made by
students taught with more focused instruction in each reading skill, in which errors
are not corrected by having students guess but by firming up the sound-it-out
strategy. The prediction is that students who are taught to guess (and
who do not know when a guess is correct), will make many more errors.
Summary
Kenneth Goodman's 1967 article helped to foster the whole
language movement, which for several decades has been the predominant approach to
reading instruction in many schools of education, school districts, and
states. However, recent experimental research has shown that many of the defining
(and allegedly revolutionary) design features of whole language (e.g.,
attempting to teach elemental reading skills--such as phonemic awareness,
sound/symbol correspondence, word identification, and spelling--in the context
of complex reading and writing activities that require these very skills) are
at odds with what is known about effective instruction. In addition,
evaluation research shows that whole language is often less effective than its
advocates claim, and is specifically less effective than field-tested curricula
that provide systematic, explicit, comprehensive, precisely planned and
logically progressive instruction on all of the elemental and complex skills in
reading.
We have examined the "viable" and "scientific"
model of reading proposed by Kenneth Goodman--a model that has guided both the methods
used in whole language (e.g., implicit, as-needed instruction; miscue analysis)
and the ways whole language advocates legitimize and valorize their
actions. The examination of Goodman's "psycholinguistic guessing
game" model revealed that Goodman:
1. Provides no data that support his presumption
that there is any such guessing game apparatus. This may be because the
guessing game is nothing but a metaphor.
2. Uses a small and selective sample of reading behavior
(errors, or "miscues") as evidence that readers use the
psycholinguistic guessing game.
3. Interprets these errors in a way that supports the
guessing game model, but fails to consider plausible alternative
interpretations and offers no evidence of inter-observer reliability of his
interpretations. [See Hempenstall (1999) for a reasoned and extensive
critique of miscue analysis.]
4. Commits the fallacy of hasty generalization by asserting
that his interpretations of some readers' guessing errors imply that all readers
use the guessing apparatus.
5. Commits the fallacy of affirming the consequent when he
reasons that errors signify the existence of a psycholinguistic guessing
apparatus, when (and more reasonably) errors signify poor instruction.
In summary, the whole language cult movement--with all of its publications, assessment instruments and devices, conferences and organizations, college courses, classroom methods, and disastrous consequences for many students--rests on a mere metaphor (the psycholinguistic guessing game) supported by assorted logical fallacies.
An interesting
sociological question is, What cultural circumstances disposed so many
education students, administrators, college professors, boards of education,
and veteran teachers to so easily and so thoroughly accept Goodman's
psycholinguistic guess game as a premise for their reading curricula?
References
Daniels, H., Zemelman, S., & Bizar, M. (2000). Whole language works: Sixty years of research. Educational Leadership, 57, 2, 32-37.
Chapman, J.W., Tunmer, W.E., & Prochnow, J.E. (1999). Success in Reading Recovery depends on the development of phonological processing skills. The Plains, VA: The National Right to Read Foundation. Online at http://www.nrrf.org/rr_study_chapman.htm
Fletcher, J.M., & Lyon, G.R. (1998). Reading: A research-based approach. In W.M. Evers (Ed.), What's gone wrong in America's classrooms (p. 40-90). Stanford, CA: Hoover Institution Press.
Foorman, B.R., Francis, D.J., Fletcher, J.M., Schatschneider, C., and Mehta, P. (1998). The role of instruction in learning to read: Preventing reading failure in at-risk children. Journal of Educational Psychology, 90, 37-55.
Goodman, K. (1967). Reading: A psycholinguistic guess game. Journal of the Reading Specialist, May, 126-135.
Goodman, K. (1976). Manifesto for a reading revolution. In F.V. Gollasch. Language and literacy: The selected writings of Kenneth S. Goodman (1986, pp. 231-241). London: Routledge & Kegan Paul.
Goodman, K. (1986). What's whole in whole language. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann Educational Books.
Gough, P. (1993). The beginning of decoding. Reading and Writing: An Interdisciplinary Journal, 5, 181-192.
Hempenstall, K. (1999). Miscue analysis: A critique. Effective School Practices, 17(3), 85-93.
Hiebert, E.H. (1995). Reading Recovery in the United States: What differences does it make to an age cohort? Educational Researcher, 23, 9, 15-25.
Liberman, A.M. (1999). The reading researcher and the reading teacher need the right theory of speech. Scientific Studies of Reading, 3, 95-111.
Moats, L.C. (2000). Whole language lives on: The illusion of "balanced" reading instruction. Washington, DC: Thomas B. Fordham Foundation. Online at http://www.edexcellence.net/library/wholelang/moats.html#foreword
National Reading Panel. (2000). Teaching children to read. National Institute of Child Health and Development. Washington, DC: US Department of Health and Human Services.
Pappas, C.C., & Pettegrew, B.S. (1998). The role of genre in the psycholinguistic guessing game of reading. Language Arts, 75, 1, 36-44.
Powell, D., & Hornsby, D. (1993). Learning phonics and spelling in a whole language classroom. New York: Scholastic Professional Books.
San Diego Unified School District (1999). Reading Recovery Research Project. Office of the Board of Education: San Diego, CA. Online at http://ww.nrrf.org_sd/rrrp.htm
Smith, F. (1985). Reading without nonsense. New York: Teachers College Press.
Stahl, S., McKenna, M.C., Pagnucco, J.R. (1994). The effects of whole instruction: An update and reappraisal. Educational Psychologist, 29, 4, 175-185.
Thompson, L.J. (1995). Habits of the mind. New York: University Press of America.
In the spirit of "if you can't beat 'em, join 'em," I've got a money makin' proposition for Professor Plum and his regular readers:
--Whole Typing--
We'll write books about how typing is just about guessing at letters, and that instruction in home row, letter reaches, and other methods of "piece by piece" instruction on how to type words ignores the fact that words are WORDS, not letters. I mean, who could argue with that: do we not call them "words" and not "collections of letters"? (Am I getting the edubabble arguments down, Professor?)
We'll argue that students should just sit down and type, and that when they type "incorrectly," we'll say that they have been confused by someone else's construct that they should have even bothered with letter-by-letter typing, and that they should be given even MORE "typing recovery" time to focus on learning the WORDS they need to type.
We'll even argue that teaching the letters in the "old fashioned" way destroys the fun and enjoyment of typing, and that it is MUCH BETTER to let kids get typing words right away, rather than get bogged down in typing letters one at a time. Geez, who can argue with that?
If it weren't for the business world ....
I was about to say that the business world would see that its new hires did not know how to type, they would do something to change the instruction of its FUTURE hires; but, alas, they have done nothing to stop the travesty of "word guessing" in reading.
I think there's a future in "research" for your graduate school, Professor.
Posted by: Ariztophanes | Wednesday, November 24, 2004 at 06:01 PM
But seriously, perhaps you should consider putting these essays together in a slim volume and float it for publication. It might be a great stocking stuffer for any conservative on your shopping list. Ho ho ho.
Sorry, I know it's still a day too early for Christmas, though the circulars in my paper this morning tell me different.
Posted by: Ariztophanes | Thursday, November 25, 2004 at 01:14 PM
But seriously, perhaps you should consider putting these essays together in a slim volume and float it for publication. It might be a great stocking stuffer for any conservative on your shopping list. Ho ho ho.
Sorry, I know it's still a day too early for Christmas, though the circulars in my paper this morning tell me different.
Posted by: Ariztophanes | Thursday, November 25, 2004 at 01:14 PM
I've only read two posts, but as far as I am concerned you are preaching to the choir.
What does a see-and-say whole-language "reader" do when coming across an unknown word without which no sense can be made? Guess. If no guess seems to work? Give up: skip.
What does someone who was schooled before this became the way to read? Guess*. If no guess seems to work? Reach for a dictionary and look it up. Maybe even both, out of curiosity - and the knowledge that said curiosity can be satisfied without having to ask everybody you meet about the word until you find someone who recognizes it.
Which would I want my kids to do? Well, does my having four dictionaries and three encyclopedias in my "Favorites" list give you an idea?
---
* Even at guessing, the phonics reader has an advantage: not only "what might fit the context" but also "might this word sound like something I have heard and understood in the oral version".
Posted by: John Anderson | Saturday, November 27, 2004 at 03:31 AM
As the science geek that I am, I noticed the good perfesser's scenario of the unskilled reader and the observer:
--==--
But we rarely see anything like this guessing process. Even when readers make a high rate of errors, reading is so fast it is hard to imagine that somewhere in their subvocal thinking they perform the mental guess work. The only thing available to the observer of the above reading sample is the reader saying, "James said, (three-second pause) This lion."
--==--
This not true any longer; an observer with the right equipment can observe quite a bit more, from the tracking of the eyes to the actual activity of different regions of the brain. One way to look at what the brain is doing is with functional magnetic resonance imaging, or fMRI.
I quote from http://www.bestbooks.biz/psychology/causes_of_dyslexia.htm:
--==--
Dr. Eden and colleagues Peter Turkeltaub, Lynn Gareau, and Dr. Tom Zeffiro of Georgetown, and Dr. Lynn Flowers of Wake Forest University, studied 41 people aged between six and 22 using fMRI to examine which parts of the brain were employed when they saw words. Using a method where subjects were asked to locate tall letters within a word - forcing them to read the words implicitly - the researchers correlated brain activity with scores on reading tests to see if more advanced readers had more activity in certain brain areas than less experienced readers, and vice versa. Then they studied brain activity during reading related to scores on tests of phonological skills.
The fMRI scans showed that young children just learning to read used the left temporal regions of their brains; increases in age and the associated gains in reading, were characterized by a suppression of the visual areas of the right hemisphere - supporting Orton's theory.
The study also showed that the same locus in the left temporal lobe engaged during reading in younger children is also more active if children are good at phonemic awareness, such as understanding that "pop" without "p" is "op." These measures are frequently employed for behavioral evaluation of children at risk for developing reading problems and these new findings provide an anatomical correlate of this ability.
--==--
In other words, whole-language theory is subject to scientific testing... and the brain activity of readers is different from that of guessers, proving it wrong. It's long past time to stop considering the advocacy of such nonsense as "academic freedom" and put it firmly in the category of fraud and charlatanism.
I got this with
http://www.google.com/search?q=fMRI+reading+skill&start=0&start=0
The first result I got was on hyperlexia, which is quite interesting in its own right.
Posted by: Engineer-Poet | Saturday, November 27, 2004 at 02:05 PM
>
--Since you seem to be so committed to scientific research, would you please provide me with scientific evidence that whole language has for two decades controlled how reading is defined and taught in schools, how reading failure is understood and handled, and how reading teachers are trained and certified?
Posted by: Sean Walmsley | Tuesday, November 30, 2004 at 06:22 PM
The evidence is in ed schools, Sean, and in state departments of public instruction, and in the organizations that certify ed schools (NCATE, for example), and in the organizations that support (or guide? or legitimize) what goes in in different areas of ed schools (e.g., International Reading Association, National Education Association, National Council of Teachers of English).
Just examine ed school course syllabi in reading; or (until No Child Left Behind) state standard courses of study; or what was advocated by NCATE, the NEA, the IRA, and the NCTE); and the articles and books written by ed professors; and the sorts of questions asked on the PRAXIS exam about reading; and the methods of instruction used in schoosl (again, until No Child Left Behind) . With rare exceptions (Texas, some universities in Florida and Oregon, and the occasional renegade ed professor) it's been whole language.
There have even been books, on the order of apologies, by persons who pushed whole language--Bill Honig, former head of ed for California, described how whole language took over California. [I forget the name of the book.]
Posted by: plum | Tuesday, November 30, 2004 at 06:58 PM
"It's Elementary!: Elementary Grades Task Force Report"
by Bill Honig, California Dept of Educ Staff, California Dept. of Education
Is this the one, Dr. P?? It is selling for .18 per used copy.
Posted by: Tribe of Dan | Tuesday, November 30, 2004 at 10:30 PM
Please see the Frankenstyle Monster (Frank[Smith]Ken[Goodman])Style
15. RALI Volume 4 Number 2
* The Frankenstyle Monster
* The Reading Foundation
* The Scandal of Britain's Illiterate Kids
* Letters
URL: http://www.telusplanet.net/public/rali/RALI_INDEX.html
I'd appreciate comments.
Posted by: Vic Charlton | Thursday, April 21, 2005 at 09:01 AM