Re: Welcome back Will!
erespess@inil.com
Tue, 17 Aug 1999 15:56:30 -0400
>Actually, I just finished teaching a graduate course at NYU called "New
>Perspectives in English Language Arts" and though I do see the probs with
>the experience Paul describes, I still subscribe to whole language
>approaches. Here's why, but don't get steamed Paul--my guess is the
>teacher you have lacks the savvy to work well with your and your daughter
>to *mediate* her individual learning concerns--anyway, we've found that
>"drill and kill" doesn't produce learning about grammar and punctuation
>very well. There's good research that shows learning language happens
>most effectively as a whole experience. I still think teachers may need
>to address skills and focus on them and I don't imagine that all "whole
>langauge" teachers are effective because their theoretical grounding is
>strong.
the way i have been taught about working with children to improve grammar
and spelling is to instead of correcting them, immediatly use the correct
form - for example...
speaking of her little sister, ashley says "her is hungry".
i reply (is she hungry? maybe we should feed her."
since children learn more by example than anything else, they will hear the
corrected version, and add it to their bank of knowledge.
unfortunately, one problem with this approach, along with what will said,
is that it requires a lot of one on one attention, which today's schools
rarely have.
if anyone sends this post back to me with corrected capitalization, i...
i... i don't know what i'll do.
and welcome back, will.
elizabeth