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Whole Language Approach - Goodman - Coggle Diagram
Whole Language Approach - Goodman
Ling - Ying (2014)
The whole language approach has been very popular and important trend in early childhood education.
Researchers hold the view that language should not be broken down into letters or combinations of letters and ordinary understandable messages decoded.
Language is a complete system of making meaning with words functioning in relation to each other in context.
Whole language is child-centred, literature based approach to language teaching that immerses students in real communication situations wherever possible.
Language is learned from whole to part. The philosophy is complex and draws on fields such as education, linguistics, psychology, sociology and anthropology.
Based on a constructivist learning theory and is considered a top-down approach.
Whole language vs phonics over the past decade has generated acrimony and demoralized educators.
Before starting the whole language approach it may be useful to introduce some central ideas from the bottom-up strategies.
Smith and Goodman critisize the bottom up approach explaining there is an over-emphaiss on decoding at the expense of other skills and concepts.
Dyson (2001) argued that literacy learning should begin with the children's social worlds. Learning about print knowledge, or gaining knowledge about reading can occur in different contexts.
McMurray and Thompson (2016)
Not a cognitive or developmental model, best described as a philosophical view.
Literacy and Language are integrated developmental phenomenon and that the processing of oral and written symbols are conceptually different.
Essentially learning how to read is a natural and effortless as learning how to produce and perceive speech.
None of the theoretical models take into consideration the mental of psychological factors that might infringe on reading development.
Each child learns to read within their own set of particular circumstances and although it is understandably difficult to quantify such factors, those seeking to put any of these models into practice must be aware they exist.
Ling (2011)
Emerged in the 1980s
Strongest point of this theory is that it regards language as a whole and thus avoids many problems in the traditional teaching methods.
Students are at the centre of the classroom teaching. The basic pattern is whole (the understanding of the whole passage) - part (the study of language points) - whole (the deep understanding of the whole text). Given various exercises the teacher tries to combine pronunciation, vocabulary and grammar into an organic whole.
The parts of language (pronunciation, grammar, vocabulary) have no meanings when they are isolated from each other.
Goodman highlights that though speaking occupies a very important place in children's language ability, it is untrue that the comprehension ability and reading and writing are not fully developed until the speaking ability is fully developed.
Language learning is not a passive, mechanical process in which students imitate language behaviour, but a process in which the students communicate with each other and exchange ideas in the language they learn, and discover and generalise language rules.
The teacher should take the students needs, aims, and interests of learning into consideration. Teacher should direct the students to use the language with positive aims and to direct the students to transfer the emphasis from studying the whole to studying the parts after they get the whole understanding.
WLT insists on putting language knowledge and abilities into real, rich and natural environments which the students can gradually and actively master the language.
The teacher should lay the emphasis on the comprehension of the whole passage and meaningful language activities.
WLA makes it easier for children to understand the whole text, it blends the practices of listening, speaking, reading and writing into an organic unity, avoiding developing the reading ability in only english reading. It adopts an informal assessment so that students can get a more objective goal.
DISADVANTAGES - Teaching of grammatical rules lack systemisation. The grammatical rules are only taught when they appear. Some grammatical rules will in turn be ignored. The word spelling and pronunciation rules are important links in the process of improving the reading ability, but the WLT pays little attention to them.
Whole language approach brings new ideas to the teaching of reading.
Adams (1991)
Whole language is carried by certain other issues that do merit serious concern - teacher empowerment, child-centred instruction, integration of reading and writing, a disavowal of the value of teaching or learning phonics, subscription to the view that children are naturally predisposed toward written language acquisition.
Phonic instruction is shown to lead to higher achievement in word recognition, spelling, vocabulary.
Smith (1973) states an unfortunate consequence of the alphabetic principle for the fluent reader is that because words have to be constructed of letters, letters must be identified in order for words to be read.
The whole language movement has become extremely important and extremely complex.
There should be an emphasis on read alouds and big book sharing and creative writing.
Children's knowledge and preparedness for reading differ in many ways as reading is complex. Effective instruction therefore relies on a deep and through and flexible understanding of knowledge and processes involved in reading and of how they vary across development and children.
The whole language approach is a valiant effort to remind us that effective instruction is accomplished not through prescription, censure, or regulations, but by teachers and children
The whole language approach should be a core movement of a long overdue and highly constructive educational revolution.
Whole language approach should should restore the confidence and authority of teachers, affirmation that education can be as effective as it is sensitive to strengths, interests and needs of its students.
Goodman and Goodman (1982)
Rooted with dewey - builds on strength and minimises preoccupation with deficiency.
Regarded as a natural extension of human language development
Involves a psycho-linguistic view of language functioning and learning relating to a socio-cultural view of language development and function.
Holistic approach.
No pre-reading skills, no formalized reading readiness. No sequence of skills or language units. Beginners must use the same information as proficient readers to make sense of print.
No separate phonics instruction. Reading does not work like that - the reader is searching for meaning, not sounds or words.
Rules taught in a phonics program are overlearned and artificial. This process is arbitrary and artificial.
The central principle is that language is best learned when the learners focus is on its communicative use.
Much of children's development occurs before they enter school and outside of school. An in-school program must be consistent with the principles and draw on learning that takes place out of school.
McMurray (2020)
WLA is a 'psycho-linguistic guessing game to tackle unknown words.
Dixon and Tuladhar (1996)
Literacy is a social skill.
WLA begins with the desire to get information.
MISSING - Discussion for group action.
Phonetic approaches can be brought into support this method.
Found that WLA has more strengths and are more complete.