Kids still learn the letters and their sounds. There is one method that relies in part on looking only at the shape of the whole word, but it's not been used much for about 15 years as it wasn't very effective.
Things that have Changed Since You were in School
- Thread starter Locutus of Bored
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J
Jetfire
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When I was in elementary school we learned what a good hug was and what a bad hug was...God only knows what kids are being told today. 
Very, VERY carefully?
When I was in school, there was no such thing as a cell phone. Only rich people had mobile car phones. And they sucked. (The phones, I mean.)
Where do you get the idea that it's easier that way? English is a phonetically written language. It's not Chinese. If kids are taught phonics, they'll be able to learn and sound out new words for themselves. If they're only taught to recognize whole words by sight, they'll have a very limited vocabulary and be unable to pronounce unfamiliar words -- which is exactly what has happened to the generation that was taught the “look-and-say” (more accurately, “look-and-guess”) method of reading.
Fortunately, schools today are returning to traditional phonics -- after raising a generation of functional illiterates.
Bipedal dinosaurs (like T-Rex) were depicted as dragging their tails on the ground everywhere they walked.
On the infrequent occasions we had any sort of "media" in school it was usually in the form of 16mm film on a cart that was used to move the projector and an approximately 25 inch diagonal rear projection screen.
On the rare occasion we were treated to video media the only mechanism was trough the program being broadcast on what is now the local PBS affiliate (VCRs hadn't been invented yet).
One of my high school math teachers demonstrated an amazing portable computer that could add, subtract, multiply and divide. It was only the size of a toaster and only cost about $7000! For our class work we had to use pencil, paper and a mechanical device called a slide rule. The year after I graduated a four function calculator nearly the size of today's external hard drives was considered a bargain at $100 and completely depleted its batteries after 3 hours of use.
Tests and the limited quantity of hand outs were reproduced using a mimeograph process that produced purplish print on the page. Thinking back, the fumes emanating from those pages when they were fresh out of the machine probably would have produced a high if inhaled for a prolonged period.
We weren't allowed candy in class but were allowed all the cherry or lemon cough drops we could afford from the school operated store.
The only time anyone was allowed to wear shorts was in high school gym class (where we changed and showered in the locker rooms). No matter how warm the June or September weather got, boys were required to wear long pants in class (jeans not permitted though). Since it would only be used for a few weeks, the classrooms weren't air conditioned. On the other hand, girls had to wear dresses or skirts to class no matter how cold the winter weather got. The girls were allowed slacks on the bus or walking to and from school, but had to change before the first class and change back to the slacks after their last class if they wanted to wear the slacks on the way home.
On the infrequent occasions we had any sort of "media" in school it was usually in the form of 16mm film on a cart that was used to move the projector and an approximately 25 inch diagonal rear projection screen.
On the rare occasion we were treated to video media the only mechanism was trough the program being broadcast on what is now the local PBS affiliate (VCRs hadn't been invented yet).
One of my high school math teachers demonstrated an amazing portable computer that could add, subtract, multiply and divide. It was only the size of a toaster and only cost about $7000! For our class work we had to use pencil, paper and a mechanical device called a slide rule. The year after I graduated a four function calculator nearly the size of today's external hard drives was considered a bargain at $100 and completely depleted its batteries after 3 hours of use.
Tests and the limited quantity of hand outs were reproduced using a mimeograph process that produced purplish print on the page. Thinking back, the fumes emanating from those pages when they were fresh out of the machine probably would have produced a high if inhaled for a prolonged period.
We weren't allowed candy in class but were allowed all the cherry or lemon cough drops we could afford from the school operated store.
The only time anyone was allowed to wear shorts was in high school gym class (where we changed and showered in the locker rooms). No matter how warm the June or September weather got, boys were required to wear long pants in class (jeans not permitted though). Since it would only be used for a few weeks, the classrooms weren't air conditioned. On the other hand, girls had to wear dresses or skirts to class no matter how cold the winter weather got. The girls were allowed slacks on the bus or walking to and from school, but had to change before the first class and change back to the slacks after their last class if they wanted to wear the slacks on the way home.
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I don't have to hear kids stumble across words like cat and dog and truck like I did growing up. Someone can just look at a word and know what it is instead of wasting 20 minutes going c- cuh cuh cuh a - ah ah ah t - tuh tuh tuh Cat. It makes reading out loud excruciating.
Phonetics and memorization can complement each other. You use phonetics with the unfamiliar words and memorization with the common words. All words would ideally move from the former category to the latter category over time.
Cuh-Cuh-Caaaat may bother you, but imagine the frustration of dealing with a kid who can read one memorized book fluently while basically having no clue how to deal with an unfamiliar text. The goal of learning isn't to keep kids dependent upon teachers. You have to give them the tools to branch out.
Besides, English is so much more enjoyable once you get a taste for how the syllables flow.
Cuh-Cuh-Caaaat may bother you, but imagine the frustration of dealing with a kid who can read one memorized book fluently while basically having no clue how to deal with an unfamiliar text. The goal of learning isn't to keep kids dependent upon teachers. You have to give them the tools to branch out.
Besides, English is so much more enjoyable once you get a taste for how the syllables flow.
That's merely a style difference: The Associated Press Stylebook dictates the removal of the final serial comma, but as far as I know, APA and MLA still use it.
Highschool...I had no internet, we were still using guilders and it was always a pain in the proverbial ass when you went shopping in Germany (I live at the border) where everything was in Deutsche Marken ofc. I do miss the rijksdaalder though. As a dutch saying goes: "On the market your guilder is worth a dollar."
How very P.C.!
The so-called “Oxford comma” is still used and acceptable in many instances. It's mainly a matter of style and clarity.
I hadnt heard of the torosaurus=triceratops thing, but I thought torosaurus was also smaller?
so now what do I do with the torosaurus figure in my dinosaur figure collection? Its mislabelled.
also arent they calling brachiosaurus giraffititan these days?
so now what do I do with the torosaurus figure in my dinosaur figure collection? Its mislabelled.
also arent they calling brachiosaurus giraffititan these days?
Staying with the dinosaur theme. When I was a wee lad no one really knew what killed the dinosaurs, now we "sorta" do.
Also, Jurrassic Park sort of threw that image of the big, dumb lizard out. So, everything I learned growing up about Dinosaurs has been debunked.
Also, Jurrassic Park sort of threw that image of the big, dumb lizard out. So, everything I learned growing up about Dinosaurs has been debunked.
I've never heard of this before now, and I think it's one of the most retarded thing I've ever read. No surprise that young Americans have problems learning new words and new languages.
I still want to know where this is going on -- I've been teaching emerging readers for 8 years and I've never seen it used successfully.
A
Amaris
Guest
Wong! L Com road juice time!
This is the big one. As a little kid, it seemed so permanent, and then suddenly it all changed so quickly later on in school.
Sakrysta - I think whether to use an Oxford comma or not depends a lot on the context of the sentence. Leaving it out "feels" best when the list is short, or the sentence straightforward. The more confusing it is, the more it needs the "space" of the comma to sort the sentence out.
SacmtoValleyMan - I've managed to continue to steer clear of Facebook & Twitter, but I recently succumbed to blogging (yeah, yeah, years behind the curve), so who knows.
