1. At least two daily periods should be given to phonics. The first
lessons will be short, but after some advance has been made, ten to
fifteen minutes should be given.
2. As far as possible let the words for phonic drill be those that will
occur in the new reading lessons.
3. Constantly review all familiar sounds, phonograms, digraphs, blends,
etc., when met in new words, and so teach pupils to apply their
knowledge of phonics.
4. Teaching them to "pantomime" the sounds--representing them mutely by
movement of the lips, tongue and palate, will aid them in silent study
at their seats.
5. By the end of the first year the pupil's phonetic knowledge, combined
with his vocabulary of sight words and his power to discover a new word,
either phonetically or by the context, ought to enable him to read
independently any primer, and to read during the year from eight to
twelve or more primers and first readers.
6. In reading, pupils should be taught to get the meaning chiefly by
context--by the parts which precede or follow the difficult word and are
so associated with it as to throw light upon its meaning.
7. When a word cannot be pronounced phonetically, the teacher should
assist by giving the sound needed, but the pupil will soon discover that
by using his wits in phonics as in other things, he can get the new word
for himself by the sense of what he is reading, e.g., in the sentence,
"The farmer came into the field" he meets the new word "field."
Naturally a second year pupil, who has learned the reasons for sounding
will apply the long sound of "i;"--as he reads it does not make sense,
so he tries short "i." Still the sentence is meaningless, so he tries
again with "e" and reads a sentence which satisfies him, because the
meaning is clear.
If the first year pupil pronounces the word "coat" as co-at (recognizing
the last combination as a member of the "at" family) the teacher will
underline and call his attention to the digraph "oa" which he has
already learned to pronounce as long "o." Most pupils however, meeting
the word in a sentence--as, "The caterpillar's coat is green"--would, if
reading thotfully recognize the word by the context.
8. Drill on obscure sounds should be omitted the first year. Unphonetic
words should be taught as sight words: as: one, many, been, said, they,
ought, eight.
9. Begin to combine words and syllables into longer words as soon as
possible: door-step, in-deed, hand-some, be-fore, ham-mer-ing,
in-no-cent, for-get-ful, car-pen-ter, side-walk, mis-take.
10. Give time increasingly to analytic-synthetic word study,
e.g.--"eight" and "rain" are taught as sight words.
eigh t r ain
Analysis: eigh ain
w eigh p ain
w eight pl ain
Synthesis: n eigh com plain
n eigh bor com plain ing