Re: Generalizations about English spelling

--- In qalam@yahoogroups.com, "Steve Bett" <stbett@...> wrote:

> Suzanne,
>
> Thank you for your thoughtful comments.
>
>
> > > 1. Alphabets provide the simplest way to write most languages.
>
> > (SUZ) This statement is meaningless without definitions, as
> > Mr. Daniels has said.
>
> SB: I wouldn't say meaningless.

I wonder if someone could help me out on this idea.

Does the use of the word "simple' for alphabet come from the German
word "einfach?" It seems that Coulmas really liked the
word "simple", by which I assume he means "einfach". Then it would
mean single fold or one-to-one mapping. That is certainly Coulmas'
meaning.

In English, however, simple comes across as primitive or basic, more
easily grasped, and Chao, 1968, would argue that Chinese words once
learned are more easily grasped. COulmas agrees.

Not that Coulmas is an authority above others, but he provides an
example for the use of the word "simple."

>I would say open to several possible
> interpretations and therefore difficult to test.
>
> > (SUZ) However, children do go through a morphemic/syllabic stage

of

> > spelling before the alphabetic stage.
>
> SB: Does this suggest to you that a morphemic/syllabic writing

system

> would be simpler than an alphabetic one?

If by "simple" one means one-to-one mapping then any level of
phonography can have that equally. However, as an orthography,
English has many-to-many mapping for the alphabetic units,
consonants and vowels, so, no, English does not have a "simple"
i.e. "einfach" orthography.

Which system is more easily grasped. Here is Tolstoy on the matter.

"One pupil has a good memory, and it is easier for him to memorize
the syllables themselves than to comprehend the vowellessness of the
consonants; another reflects calmly and will comprehend a most
rational sound method; another has a fine instinct and grasps the
law of word combinations by reading whole words at a time." This
quote appeared in Tolstoy on Education, 1967.

>
> > > 2. The alphabet works by the principle that letters represent
> > >speech sounds.
>
> > > SB: Most writing systems contain more than just sound signs.
> > > They also include a few meaning signs
>
> > (SUZ) I am afraid speech sounds doesn't mean much. Most writing
> systems are discussed based on the type of phonology that is
> represented.
>
> SB: These statements were an attempt to communicate with the
>general
> public.

Speech sounds? If you don't want to write an essay on the topic call
these things consonants and vowels. Maybe Mr. D. has a better idea.

>The idea was that the dictionary pronunciation guide
> represents how an alphabet is supposed to work. The symbols
> represent phonemes found in the broadcast dialect.
>
> > > 3. Literacy is easily acquired if the spelling tells readers

the

> > >pronunciation, and the pronunciation tells writers the spelling.
>
> > I hate to do this but yes, define literacy.
>
> SB: The quality or state of being literate;-)
> (see my earlier post)
>
> > In various highly publicized international literacy studies
> > Finland, Scotland and Japan have all done well - all different
> > types of writing systems. The highest correlation is usually
> > considered to be between "economic support of education
> > infrastructure" and "level of literacy". You want to do a lot of
> > research to make a statement about this one way or another.
>
> SB: These are not my statements. Upward thought that an overly
> complex writing system handicaps learners. He agreed with G. Dewey
> that (traditional) English Spelling was a roadblock to reading.
>
> > One Study comparing English and German children showed that in
> > grade 3 German children were ahead of English children, but in
> > grade 6 they could all read at the same level of competency.
>
> SB: What was the test used to determine reading competency?
> By grade 6 most students can read 1000 or so word-signs. You

would

> almost have to have a spelling test to differentiate a shallow and

a

> deep orthography.
>
> Upward did publish a study in Reading Research that showed that

2nd

> year students of German could spell in German better than they

could

> in English. Upward was a professor of German.

How could I not guess? Sure, if the professor is speaking to you in
High German and then you have to spell High German - no problem.
However, if you spend the summer near Tuebingen and then come back
to your German class and open your mouth and the prof. says "Aber,
Schwaebisch ist kein Deutsch!" then what? You find that you went to
Germany for the summer and now you don't speak German, you only
speak Swabian and that doesn't help you spell the most basic verb
form in German.

However, I would 10 times over rather spell German than French,
which I can read fluently and spell with trepidation. It is regular
but complicated and most ;) of it silent.

> The issue is whether or not the non-transparency of a written code

is

> a major reason for reading failure. Half of the students will

learn

> to read any writing system no matter how it is taught. The
> performance of the lowest quartile is where orthographic

transparency

> should make the most difference.
>
> > (SUZ) I think the consensus is that anyone can learn to read any
> > writing system, but some writing systems are harder to spell. I
> > teach dyslexics so I don't say this lightly.
>
> > Personally, I am waiting for a better spell-checker - one that

will

> > accept 'wut' for 'what'
>
> The Franklin spellers can almost decipher spellings such as wut.

You

> will receive a list of possible words: wot, what,...

Thanks for that tip. The spell-check experimenting just slid off my
list of things to complete last year.

>>
>
> > (SUZ) The problem with these studies is that they are using a
> completely different, if valid in its own way, definition of

literacy.

>
> SB: There are dozens of ways to define literacy and when one

claims

> to have achieved it in record time, it is important to know what

kind

> of literacy has been achieved.
>
> Laubach defined literacy as the ability to read a newspaper.
> To be more precise there would be no difference in understanding
> between a newspaper article they read and one that was read to

them.

>
> When I talk about literacy I usually mean understanding the code
> which is a step up from phonemic awareness. Can the student
> recognize a word they use in speech from a sequence of sound-signs

on

> the page. To be code literate they would have to be able to
> recognize words they had never seen in print.
>
> Over half of those who learned using the i/t/a in the 1960's could
> not do this. They could not spell unfamiliar words in i/t/a. They

had

> not overlearned the system. I would not call them code literate.
>
> The method used to teach the i/t/a was optimized for learning

sight

> words and this complicated the transition to traditional spelling

in

> the 3rd grade.
>
> What Swadesh, Pike, Laubach, and others are saying is that code
> literacy can be achieved in 3 months or less.

When we analyse the students who don't achieve the literacy standard
in a grade 7 class, maybe 25%, only about 5 - 8 % seem to be lacking
in code literacy. The others just have no idea what the subject
matter is. In kindergarten to grade 3 or 4, code literacy is
paramount. However, even when one can really change those statistics
in the early grades it is hard to maintain that for grade 7.

I should add that administrators really want those grade 7 stats! SO
now the push is to teach oral vocabulary and discussion skills.

I won't say there is no reason to want a regular orthography, but it
hasn't been proved to people that it would make enough of a
difference across the board to warrant doing anything about it.

Coulmas again. "From the point of view of reading it is quite
impractical that the sound stream of speech is broken up into units
corresponding only in a complex way to phonemes, because the
skiolled reader of an alphabetically written text does not read
letter by letter anyway but by larger units, (Frank Smith, 1973)

A morphemic or word-sign system can be processed faster than a
system operating on a cenemic level of smaller units. Because of its
higher information load, a Chinese character sticks out on a page
and is easily detected if looked for. An alphabetically written word
is not so prominent because of the uniformity of the letters.

It is, of course, another question as to whether if is worth the
great effort of learning an uneconomical system such as the Chinese
for the benefit of eventually more convenient use. From the point of
view of writing, on the other hand, a logographic system such as the
Chinese asks much more of its users than a rational and regular
cenemic orthography.

TO conclude, the merits and demerits of scripts of different levels
must be specified relative to different purposes. Readers, and
writiers, native and foreign language users, dialect and stnadard
speakers, linguists nad poets do not all have the same needs, and
their respective demands on a suitable writing system are sometimes
in conflict." Coulmas, 1993, p. 52-53

Suzanne

>
> --Steve