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Beginning To Read:
Thinking and Learning about Print
Marilyn Jager Adams
Contents
Foreword by P. David Pearson
v
Acknowledgments ix
PART I Introduction 1
Chapter 1 Putting Word Recognition in Perspective 3
Chapter 2 Reading Words and Meaning: From an Age-Old Problem to a Contemporary Crisis
13
PART II Why Phonics? 29
Chapter 3
Program Comparisons (And, by the Way, What Is phonics?)
31
Chapter 4
Research on Prereaders
55
PART III
What Needs to Be Taught? Hints from Skilled Readers 93
Chapter 5 Outside-In Models of Reading: What Skilled Readers Look Like They Do
95
Chapter 6 Analyzing the Reading Process: Orthographic Processing 107
Chapter 7
Analyzing the Reading Process: Use and Uses of Meaning 137
Chapter 8 Adding the Phonological Processor: How the Whole System Works Together 157
PART IV
Thinking, Learning, and Reading 193
Chapter 9
The Nature of Learning (Words or Otherwise)
195
Chapter 10
On the Goals of Print Instruction: What Do We Want Students to Learn? 215
PART V Learning How to Read 235
Chapter 11
On Teaching Phonics First 237
Chapter 12 Phonological Prerequisites: Becoming Aware of Spoken Words, Syllables, and
Phonemes
293
Chapter 13
Learning about Print: The First Steps
333
Chapter 14
To Reading from Writing
375
PART VI
Summary and Conclusion 407
Chapter 15
The Proper Place of Phonics 409
Afterword by Dorothy Strickland and Bernice Cullinan 425
References 435
Name Index 475
Subject Index 485
and Dykstra, the directors of the First Grade Studies, did not have).
Second, the book also has a tremendous theoretical advantage over the
earlier works: It can place all the current and prior research on visual
and auditory perception and basic reading processes within the context
of Rumelhart and McClelland's work on parallel distributed
processing. Such an integrated theory did not exist twenty years ago.
Readers who, like me, have puzzled over how to reconcile data we
considered irreconcilable (for example, data showing that every letter
must be processed with data showing that there is a direct, unmediated
spelling-to-meaning linkage in skilled reading) will find PDP (I like the
initials) theory fascinating and illuminating.
Readers will find that the book is well written. Adams has a special
talent for explaining complex theoretical concepts. She uses examples,
analogies, and allusions generously. Everyone will find some
comfortable ideas, some hooks to use to get a handle on what might
otherwise be very abstract concepts. Furthermore, she is not afraid to
use personal experience and anecdotes to drive home a point that, with
only theory and data to support it, might well remain lifeless.
The book is comprehensive. Adams covers the past twenty years of
basic and applied research thoroughly; her search through educational
and psychological books and journals was exhaustive. She
acknowledges historical predecessors (and precedents) graciously; it is
clear that she has read Chall, Flesch, Bond and Dykstra, Aukerman,
Balmuth, N.B. Smith, and Mathews very carefully. She even
undertakes a reconciliation of some of the data coming from research
on spelling and writing (invented-spelling work, for example) and
sociolinguistic perspectives (Heath in the South, Teale in the
Southwest) with theory and research more commonly associated with
psychology.
I suspect that the book will attract some of the strong negative
reactions we had originally worried about. Dyed-in-the-wool phonics
advocates will be disappointed by its conciliatory tone, which they
will see as too compatible with meaning-based approaches to teaching
reading. They will be alarmed that Adams admits to a direct spelling-
meaning connection, or that lots of students infer the entire symbolsound system from vast exposure to print. Likewise, whole language
advocates will be disappointed at Adams's insistence that the symbolsound system be taught explicitly and early. They will be alarmed at
her suggestion that phonemic awareness training ought to be one of
the earliest items on the instructional agenda.
I suspect the positive reactions will be just as strong. Phonics
advocates will applaud Adams's uncompromising emphasis on
spelling patterns and their relation to speech patterns. At the same
time, whole language advocates will appreciate her insistence that
orthographic knowledge cannot simply be taught; it must be
understood, and it can only be understood when it is used in
meaningful engagements with print.
Especially strong reactions should come from instructional
"moderates" who believe, along with the late John Downing, that the
goal of all instruction, be it phonics, vocabulary, comprehension,
studying, thinking, or mathematical problem solving, ought to be to
promote cognitive clarity for students. That is the message I take from
the book; I hope others can find it here too.
I have read the book from start to finish in a single (admittedly long)
reading. But I have used it more often as a reference work, revisiting
the elaborate sections on phonemic awareness because I find the
concept and the research so fascinating, or poring over the sections on
parallel distributed processing in yet another attempt to see how it all
fits together. I think most readers will use it as a reference work, but I
invite everyone to read it initially as an enlightening and enjoyable
(you will like the way Adams writes) experience.
You will recall that when we at the Center undertook this (ad) venture,
we had many concerns, but we hoped that Adams might be able to
produce a report that we could support and even take pride in. She
did! We can! We do!
Acknowledgments
I am deeply indebted to a number of people for their comments and
suggestions during the preparation of this book. First among these are
the members of the advisory panel: Ira Aaron, Alumni Foundation
Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Reading Education, University of
Georgia-Athens; Jeanne S. Chall, Professor of Education and Director
of the Reading Laboratory at the Graduate School of Education,
Harvard University; Bernice E. Cullinan, Professor, Department of
Early Childhood and Elementary Education, New York University;
Linnea C. Ehri, Professor of Education in the Division of Education,
University of California-Davis; Philip Gough, Professor of Psychology
and Education, University of Texas-Austin; Dorothy Strickland,
Professor of Education and Deputy Director of the Institute for Urban
and Minority Education, Teachers College, Columbia University; and
Robert Ruddell, Professor of Education and Chair of the Division of
Language and Literacy, Graduate School of Education, University of
California-Berkeley. Each panel member read and commented on
interim drafts of the manuscript. In addition, the entire panel convened
on July 30, 1988, in Cambridge, Massachusetts, to discuss its progress
and direction.
I am also indebted to the following members of the review board for
their critical readings of those sections most relevant to their own
expertise: Richard Allington, Department of Reading, State University
of New York-Albany; Jonathan Baron, Department of Psychology,
University of Pennsylvania; Roderick Barron, Department of
Psychology, University of Guelph, Ontario; Isabel Beck, Learning
Research and Development Center, University of Pittsburgh; Robert
Calfee, School of Education, Stanford University; Doug Carnine,
College of Education, University of Oregon; Anne Cunningham,
Graduate School of Education, University of California-Berkeley;
Mary Beth Curtis, Graduate School of Education, Harvard University;