What about whole language?

Myth: Whole language teaching is just the same as the whole word method of teaching children to read; it is widely used; and it's responsible for all the illiteracy in our country today.

Reality: Whole language teaching is very different from a whole word approach for teaching reading; even today, very few teachers are whole language teachers; and whole language could not be responsible for adult illiteracy because hardly any teachers practiced it before the late 1980s and early 1990s.

Whole language is a research-based philosophy of learning and teaching, not a method of teaching reading. Whole language teaching reflects the constructivist view of learning that underlies current methods of teaching in most disciplines today—most notably, math and science. Constructivism acknowledges that we learn best by doing—by trying things out for ourselves, with assistance as needed. Individual interest is recognized as an important stimulus to learning, and this leads to giving students many choices in what they read, write, and study. Furthermore, whole language teachers constantly assess children's learning and promote their development as learners, focusing on the processes that lead to superior quality products. Because they view all children as successful learners to some degree and reject the sorting and labeling of children according to arbitrary standards, whole language teachers are sometimes viewed as lacking in standards. However, nothing could be farther from the truth. Whole language teachers simply recognize that we do not all learn in the same way, at the same time. Their purpose is to help all children achieve their personal best, not to find ways of labeling some children as unsuccessful.

Whole language ways of teaching reading are very different from the whole word approach popular from the 1930s to about the mid 1960s. Through repetition of words and sometimes the use of flash cards, a whole word approach emphasized learning words as wholes. In contrast, whole language instruction goes from whole texts to words and parts of words. For instance, a teacher might read to children a simple text: perhaps a song, poem, or patterned story. As she rereads the text, she points to each word and encourages the children to chime in. From repeated readings, the children learn to read many of the words—and learn phonics as well. In fact, some recent research studies suggest that knowing a lot of print words promotes phonics knowledge and the use of phonics better than instruction in phonics does. However, whole language teachers do not merely leave the learning of phonics to chance. Beginning with familiar texts, they focus children's attention on concepts of print (such as the fact that we read left-to-right in English), specific words, letter/sound patterns (phonics), and reading strategies. Reading skills and strategies are not only taught but assessed directly, as children actually read and write, which enables teachers to determine what additional instruction is needed. Of course, whole language teachers also read books to and discuss them with children, and these are often books more complex than the children could read or understand by themselves. In whole language classrooms, children become not only successfully but joyfully literate—connoisseurs of books and authors and illustrators.

Myth: Whole language educators think learning to read is just like learning to talk.

Reality: This is an exaggeration, though they see some parallels.

Whole language educators see at least two important parallels between learning to speak one's native language and learning to read the way many children have learned to read in the home and in school. First, in both cases the child is most concerned with meaning; adult speech and adult accuracy in reading are mastered only gradually. In other words, children learning to talk begin with the "whole" of what they want to communicate, and only gradually master the parts. Similarly with reading: it is easiest for most children to become familiar with and retell enjoyable and interesting texts, then learn more and more of the words and the letter/sound patterns within them. A second important point is that both learning to talk and learning to read are facilitated when adults treat children as meaning-makers and focus on meaning first.

Myth: Whole language teachers don't teach literacy skills, especially phonics. They just teach children to guess at words when they read.

Reality: Whole language teachers teach skills in the context of learning to read and write.

Whole language teachers know that children generally learn and apply skills best when the skills are taught in the context of what the children are trying to accomplish. When children are reading, for example, whole language teachers will help them learn to predict (to "think ahead," not to guess), to use context along with phonics knowledge to get difficult words, to notice when something they've read doesn't make sense, and to reread to solve the problem. When children are ready to revise their writing, whole language teachers will help them learn punctuation and spelling. As writers gain more experience and skill, whole language teachers will also teacher grammar in the context of writing—helping children rearrange, expand, or combine sentences, for instance, and helping them learn to edit for standard conventions. Of course various aspects of phonics, spellings, and grammar are also taught in focused lessons, but whole language teachers have found that guiding children in using language skills is often the most effective and efficient way of teaching them.

Myth: There's no research that supports whole language teaching.

Reality: There is a growing body of research that supports it.

Various lines of research support whole language teaching, including research on how children learn to read and write plus research into the nature of the reading process. Since 1985, a new body of comparative research suggests that children get off to a better start as readers when they are taught to use reading skills and strategies as they are reading and writing whole, interesting texts: the primary way they are taught in whole language classrooms. The seemingly contrary research typically uses only standardized tests to measure reading. But studies using diverse measures of reading development suggest that in comparison with children in classrooms where skills are taught in isolation, children in such skills-in-context classrooms—including "at risk" children—typically developed more strategies for dealing with problems in reading, made better use of phonics knowledge, could better retell what they had read, and were more confident and independent as readers. Typically the skills-in-context children also scored as well or very slightly better on standardized reading tests and even on subtests of phonics knowledge. On the National Assessment of Educational Progress, children in whole language-like classrooms typically score better than children in classrooms that teach skills mainly in isolation.

REFERENCES AND RESOURCES

Based mostly on articles for Reconsidering a Balanced Approach to Reading, edited by Constance Weaver (National Council of Teachers of English, 1997).

Weaver, C., L. Gillmeister-Krause, & G. Vento-Zogby. (1996). Creating Support for Effective Literacy Education. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.

©1996 Michigan for Public Education, <http://www.ashay.com/mpe>; relevant research is discussed in more detail in C. Weaver (Ed.), Reconsidering a balanced approach to reading (National Council of Teachers of English, forthcoming). In C. Weaver, L. Gillmeister-Krause, & G. Vento-Zogby, Creating Support for Effective Literacy Education (Heinemann, 1996). Revised July 1997. May be copied.