Alphabetic Approach In Reading

Reading is a complex process that needs to be taught. For beginners, an essential part of learning to read involves an understanding of alphabetic principle that directly links to phonics instruction (Adams, 1990; Brish 2011; NRP, 2000; Snow et al., 1998). It is important to distinguish between phonemic awareness and phonics instruction because they are not the same; phonics instruction requires grapheme-phoneme correspondences, spelling patterns, and applying this knowledge in reading. The NRP (2000) provides solid evidence for contributions of systematic and explicit phonics instruction to reading acquisition. The goal of all phonics programs is to enable learners to use the alphabetic code so that they can learn to read and comprehend …show more content…
The program uses a multisensory approach and includes playful, creative, and flexible activities and instructions. Children are taught with mnemonics and hand movements to help them to remember the letter-sound correspondences. For example, while introducing s sound, the program advices: “Start by telling the story about a boy who takes his dog for a walk, hears the dog barking and then sees a snake rear up hissing 'sssssssssssssss '. The suggested story line is given in note form so it can be told in a personal way. The sound and action is incorporated in each story. In this case the snake makes the 'ssss ' sound and the action is the children waving their arms, imitating the movement of the snake, and saying 'ssss ' The children are told that this is one of the letter sounds” (Lloyd, 2007, …show more content…
The present study involves systematic classroom observations to examine instructional strategies and activities of Visual Phonics. Therefore, the findings of this study will be in line with the NRP’s suggestion (effects of using hand motions as active ingredients of phonics programs). Visual Phonics has an advantage over those two programs because it is not a complete phonics program. Visual Phonics hand cues can be easily incorporated into any phonics programs, so teachers do not need to instruct a completely new phonics program, which can be expensive and time consuming. The existing one may turn into an effective phonics program to promote children’s learning by using hand cues. Furthermore, Visual Phonics is inexpensive (total investment of $50 to $100 is enough for many years) and easy to learn (typically 6 hours) (Cihon, Gardner, Morrison, & Paul,