Title: Why Jacques, Johann and Jan CAN Read
Description: This book reports the author's oral reading accuracy research on over 900 second graders in five languages in the United States and Europe in 1977-1978  The data showed that teaching beginning reading by sight-word "meaning" or by phonic "sound" had developed diametrically opposite types of readers, with relative mixtures falling in between.  The data also proved that teaching beginning reading by sight-word "meaning" instead of by phonic "sound" had not only produced inaccurate oral reading but had damaged so-called reading comprehension.  Therefore, so-called reading comprehension, instead of being the supposed Crown Jewel of the sight-word "meaning" method, turned out to be its Achilles Heel.
Subjects: Reading, Phonetic method, Reading (Elementary), Whole-word method, Language experience approach, History