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Phonics vs. Whole Language Reading Instruction

Parents of young readers might be confused when hearing about the " reading wars" over how best to teach children to read. Since the 1980s, there has been a conflict between proponents of phonics-based reading instruction and those who favor the whole-language approach. Here's what you need to know to find peace in the war:

Phonics-Based Reading Instruction

Phonics-based reading instruction is a methodology for teaching young children to read and spell words. The teacher introduces a series of spelling rules and teaches the child to apply phonetics (how the letter combinations sound out loud) to decode words based on their spellings. Phonics attempts to break written language down into small and simple components.
What is decoding? ›
Whole Language Reading Instruction

In the simplest terms, " whole language " is a method of teaching children to read by recognizing words as whole pieces of language. Proponents of the whole language philosophy believe that language should not be broken down into letters and combinations of letters and "decoded." Instead, they believe that language is a complete system of making meaning, with words functioning in relation to each other in context.

Hybrid Approach

It is rare to find reading instruction that is purely whole language. Most teachers of whole language reading use "embedded phonics." This is a technique wherein children are instructed in letter-sound relationships when they read text (as opposed to being taught the relationships in isolation prior to practicing reading). This is an indirect method of using phonics instruction. Whole language reading instruction requires that students memorize words so that they can recognize them on sight. These are called "sight words." Embedded phonics instruction is always conducted using literature to provide context, and teachers use this reading strategy when the opportunity presents itself, rather than systematically and in isolation from literature.
View a list of reading strategies ›
What Does the Research Say?

In explicit phonics instruction, children learn the rules as well as the exceptions to them, and they are not taught to memorize words. Reading researchers have verified that memorization of sight words has not been proved to increase reading fluency (the speed with which a reader can read and comprehend text).

These "reading wars" over phonics vs. whole language instruction have been debated for more than a hundred years, primarily due to the complexity of the English language. Horace Mann argued that phonics should not be used at all. The Dick and Jane readers that many parents may remember fondly were an outgrowth of the anti-phonics movement of the middle twentieth century. However, by the 1950s, phonics began to increase in popularity due to the number of students who had difficulty with the "look/say" approach to reading used in the Dick and Jane reading series.

The debate has shifted over time since the introduction of the whole language philosophy of teaching reading. The whole language approach, which emphasized identifying words using literary context and barely focusing on sounds, could not be reconciled with the phonics focus on individual sounds' correspondence to letters and letter combinations. For that reason, a polarized dichotomy arose and created a raging debate. Congress commissioned panels to study the teaching of reading and the U.S. Department of Education conducted its own research and reviews.

Today, most teachers in the United States combine phonics with some elements of whole language, particularly those that emphasize reading comprehension. However, you need to make your own decision on how you will teach reading in your classroom. To make a more informed decision, check out our free teacher resources.

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Parents of young readers might be confused when hearing about the " reading wars" over how best to teach children to read. Since the 1980s, there has been a conflict between proponents of phonics-based reading instruction and those who favor the whole-language approach.

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Most reading teachers place some importance on the teaching of sight words. However, what each teacher means by sight words varies more than the flavors at the local ice cream parlor. For clarity, reading specialists have defined two types of "word attack" skills: word identification and word recognition. Sight words are classified on the word recognition side of the coin. Some teachers consider sight words high frequency reading words and trot out Fry or Dolch word lists. These words consist of those most frequently found in basal reading series. "By the end of second grade, your child must have memorized the top 200 words."

Other teachers see sight words as high utility spelling words. You can spot these teachers by their prominently displayed "No Excuse" spelling words on a colorful bulletin board. Thanks to Rebecca Sitton, these collections of words are the words that children most often use in their beginning writing. "By the end of second grade, your child must have mastered the spelling of these words in their writing-no excuses!"

Still other teachers understand and teach sight words as word family (rimes) words. A rime is a vowel and final consonants in one syllable, such as "ick." The rime usually follows an initial consonant, e.g. "t," or consonant blend, e.g. "tr," to form words, e.g., "tick" or "trick." Teachers using rimes have their students memorize what these chunks of words look and sound like and then apply these to other starting consonants (called onsets) to recognize or say new words. "By the end of second grade, your child must know every one of these 79 word families with automaticity." Get a comprehensive list of rimes and terrific learning activities Word Families (Rimes) Activities.

The last group of teachers view sight words as Outlaw Words. That's right... stick 'em up, cowboy! These words break the law, that is they break the rules of the alphabet code and are non-phonetic. Words such as the and love are Outlaw Words because readers can't sound them out. Unfortunately, many of our high frequency and high utility words happen to be non-decodable. Linguists tell us that these are holdovers from our Old English roots.

So Which Sight Words Should We Teach?

Although reading research clearly supports systematic explicit phonics as the most efficient instructional methodology, as a reading specialist I support a Heinz 57® approach to sight word practice. Although not a substitute for explicit phonics instruction, memorizing key sight words does make sense to promote reading automaticity. And, as a bonus, parents can be helpful partners in practicing sight words with their children. Although oftentimes well-intentioned parents frequently do more harm than good when they teach their children to blend improperly (think "buh-ay-nuh-kuh" sound-out for bank), practicing sight words is almost foolproof.

For older students, say second-graders or reading intervention students (think Response to Intervention Tiers I and II), these Outlaw Words and Rimes Assessments with recording matrix provides teachers with the data they need to effectively differentiate instruction.
For more tips on teaching reading to your students, sign up for the Reading Horizons Online Reading Workshop today!
About the Author:

Mark Pennington, MA Reading Specialist, is an educational author, presenter, reading specialist, and middle school teacher. Mark has taught in the elementary, middle school, high school, and community college settings. Mark's English-language arts/reading resources help teachers differentiate instruction for the diverse needs of their students. Mark is the author of the comprehensive series, Teaching Reading Strategies. Visit his blog at: http://penningtonpublishing.com/blog/

About the Author

Angie Stevens

Angie graduated with a B.S. in Marketing and a minor in Psychology from the University of Utah in 2009-where she completed all of her coursework in under three years. Angie has always been passionate about education, especially education reform, and this passion has only grown as she has worked for Reading Horizons over the last six years. Angie enjoys working at Reading Horizons because of the opportunities to learn and develop new skills, play cards at lunch, and associate with so many amazing people that are determined to make a difference and continuously improve. Angie's greatest joy in life is spending time with her niece and nephew-whom, because of her experiences working with Reading Horizons-she loads with books. Angie also enjoys being involved in her community, traveling, boating, hiking, reading, writing, designing, and trying anything new!

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Different Strategies for Teaching Sight Words to Beginning Readers

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Most reading teachers place some importance on the teaching of sight words. However, what each teacher means by sight words varies more than the flavors at the local ice cream parlor. For clarity, reading specialists have defined two types of "word attack" skills: word identification and word recognition.

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Teacher to Teacher Ideas in the Top Teaching Blog | Scholastic

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Exciting lesson ideas, classroom strategies, teaching tips, book lists, videos, and reproducibles in a daily blog by teachers from the classrooms of extraordinary mentor

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Reading Worksheets, Spelling, Grammar, Comprehension, Lesson Plans

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All parents and teachers want their children to be good readers. With so many different approaches to reading instruction choosing strategies and activities to help them develop into strong, confident readers is difficult. To compound the situation today's kids, parents and teachers are all busy! As adults we are constantly faced with deciding what activities are the best use of our time with our kids. Sight word instruction is one of the best uses of the time you spend helping your children learn to read. Here are some of the many wonderful benefits of teaching sight words to your children:

1. Sight words are confidence builders. The power of self-efficacy (a person's belief in his ability to accomplish a task) in learning situations cannot be underestimated. When children believe they can learn something new they are much more likely to actually acquire new knowledge. Children are smart though! They don't always believe they can complete a task just because we tell them they can. They need evidence that they have what it takes to achieve. Sight words can provide this proof for a developing reader. Because Dolch's sight words make up 50 to 75% of the words in any children's text knowing these lists of high frequency words gives young readers a huge advantage when attempting to read new stories. When a child sees that she recognizes more than half of the words on the page, she has the confidence to attempt to read it.

2. Sight words free up a child's energy to tackle more challenging words. Reading is tough work! As fluent readers we often underestimate the amount of focus and energy reading takes when you don't know most of the words on the page before you. When children have to decode each word that they encounter in a sentence, they not only become frustrated they begin to lose the meaning of the text. They become so focused on "sounding out" the words that they are not able to think about what the words are actually saying. Once children know Dolch's sight words, they only need to slow down their reading to focus on decoding new, challenging words.

3. Sight words provide clues to the meaning of a sentence. Even though many of the Dolch sight words contain fewer than five letters, they are critical to a text's meaning. While many pieces of children's literature use illustrations as a companion to words, ultimately we want our young readers to be able to decipher the meaning of a text primarily by reading and understanding the words. Sight words help children make sense of what they are reading by providing clues to the overall meaning of a sentence. Take for example a few of the verbs from Dolch's pre-primer list: jump, play, see. The sentence "I jump in the pool" takes on a whole new meaning when one of the other two verbs are substituted. Similarly, understanding the meaning of pronouns such as I, you, she and he (all sight words on the pre-primer and primer lists) is essential to comprehending the sentences they are used in.

4. Sight words sometimes defy decoding strategies. While phonics instruction is vital in helping children learn to read, its strategies, especially teaching children to sound out unfamiliar words are not always useful. The English language has many words that cannot be "discovered" by a young reader using phonics. A good number of these words are used frequently in texts. For example, four, blue, please and said are among the most commonly used words in children's stories. It is fruitless for a child to spend time attempting to sound out these words because they do not follow standard phonetic rules. These and many other sight words need to be taught to children so that they can instantly recognize and understand the words when they come across them in texts.

5. Sight word instruction builds a foundation for reading new, more complex words. The benefits of sight word instruction extend far beyond their immediate use in helping young people learn to read. Not only do these words continue to appear in more advanced texts, the process of learning sight words builds important learning behaviors that the reader will forever use to learn new vocabulary. When children learn a sight word they are making a connection between their prior knowledge of the word (its pronunciation and meaning) and its spelling. The process of merging the two is mediated by their knowledge of the alphabet. The letters and their corresponding sounds create a mnemonic that helps the child remember the word. Researchers say once a child has repeatedly practiced this skill for learning vocabulary by moving through the lists of sight words, the process becomes ingrained in her repertoire of reading skills. She will then instinctively begin using this method for integrating new, more complex sight words into her knowledge base.

6. Sight words enhance ESL instruction. With the increasing number of ESL students joining today's communities and classrooms, it is incumbent upon teachers to find ways to reach this unique group of students. One of the main goals of ESL instruction is to teach children functional English language skills. Teaching sight words to ESL learners gives them tremendous advantages. Because many of the sight words on Dolch's lists not only occur frequently in children's stories, but also daily conversations, it is extremely beneficial to focus ESL instruction on sight word learning. Beyond this, some of the verbs that form the foundation of the lists (and of English language texts) take on irregular forms. Consider the changes that the common verbs go, be and do go through when applied to different singular and plural nouns. Because they do not follow standard rules, the only way to learn these conjugations is through memorization.

View the full archive of sight words articles.

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All parents and teachers want their children to be good readers. With so many different approaches to reading instruction choosing strategies and activities to help them develop into strong, confident readers is difficult. To compound the situation today's kids, parents and teachers are all busy!

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Dolch vs. Fry