Phonics for the Aboriginal Classroom

Extract

Much has been said and written by the reading specialists about the way children learn to read and how teachers should be facilitators in this natural process. Frank Smith says that phonics need not be taught in the classroom; in fact he says it makes the learning to read process more difficult for children (Smith 1973, p.185).

Phonics or grapho-phonics tells a reader and writer how spelling patterns relate to sound sequences (Reed 1977, p.393). Whether phonics is taught incidentally on a one-to-one basis or whether it is taught more formally, I believe phonics does have a place in the classroom today, particularly in the bilingual Aboriginal classroom. Teachers of Aboriginal children should feel free to teach phonics, despite what the specialists say.

Much that has been written relates to native English-speaking children, brought up in a literate society where newspapers and bedtime stories are the norm. In this paper I am concerned with non-English speaking tribal Aboriginal children, in a pre-literate society. They attend bilingual schools where they learn to read and write first in the vernacular and then in English. I will point out that what the reading specialists advocate in learning to read naturally, is not always sound advice for tribal Aboriginal children learning to read and write in the vernacular.