Hi Charles. 
 I found I was tired when I read your last post as you seem to be arguing 
 for the sake of it. I have better things to do. There is a day or two time
 delay in the messages and in today's download I find others have more than
 adequately answered your comments about teaching scribble.
 This is where I decided to butt out as you yanks might say. We have already 
 discussed this several times over...
 
 But then I saw a moment of light...
 DT>It's the teachable moment.  A child can be taught to use the dictionary. 
 CB> I forget sometimes that you use an approach to whole language that 
 CB> is inconsistent with my image of the process.  The concept of 
 CB> inventive spelling that *I'm* working with does not include spelling 
 CB> instruction - yet you *do* teach some spelling.  I know that you 
 CB> don't use a spelling book, but at the Kindergarten level that is 
 CB> probably appropriate.
 Isn't a dictionary the best spelling book? We have discussed this too. My 
 children have a dictionary of their own. When they ask, "how do you spell
 ...?" and find me the appropriate page, I write it for them. If their 
 handwriting was neater I'd make them write it themselves. 
 You never did reply to my comments about children who can't remember the 
 names of the letters let alone the sound they make most often.
 
 How can one teach a mainly phonic method when a child has not experienced
 enough language when they come to school and can't even tell you the names 
 of the letters in their name? One or two in my class have taken all year 
 to do this and probably won't know 26 letters by the end of the year. They 
 are the same two who won't be able to do one digit addition and get 100%  
 correct by the end of the year, which is, by the way what I expect from my 
 class by December. Are you suggesting whole language is responsible for 
 this. Of course not but then your only reply to my comment about the 
 diversity of ability even at 5 was the teaching methods were at fault. I   
 counter that by saying that a two year old who was visiting me yesterday 
 had more language development than the two cases in my class. The 
 difference is in the involvement of listeners/parents and good modelling of 
 language. Most early childhood teachers can tell which children have come
 from a language conducive environment when they walk through the door on 
 the first day. They'll be the ones who know their name, colours, can count 
 and have been read to and conversed with.
 I think Dan and Ruth and I have more than adequately explained how we use 
 phonics as part of a whole language environment.
 I also offered to post you a bibliography of some "research" into whole 
 language. Look up Brian Cambourne. 
 By the way, when I was a pre-schooler apparently I would write on anything 
 I could get my hands on including a few walls. I have a few pieces of this 
 "scribble". I hope you aren't suggesting that when I was two my mother, 
 who is a teacher, should have made me write it correctly. You see, Charles, 
 I grew up in a rich environment, but some of the children we get at school
 these days haven't. They may be at the stage I was at at two but they are 
 five or even six.
 I'll post another message where I'll show some spelling.
 Erica.
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