--- In qalam@yahoogroups.com, "Peter T. Daniels"
<grammatim@...> wrote:

> What use is a syllabary chart keyed with roman letters to

someone

> without roman-letter (i.e. English) literacy?

It is like doing division on a multiplication table chart. You locate
the dividend (symbol) in the middle of the chart, through a
laborious row by row search, and then you trace back to the y
axis to find the divisor and then to the x axis for the quotient.
Then you input the quotient and the divisor and hope that your
product is the original dividend (symbol) that you started with in
the first place.

Of course, you still have to learn the letters of the alphabet, but it
could just possibly be done.

> You would look a lot
> less foolish if you would simply consult the psycholinguistic

literature

> on syllable segmentation.

> A person learns to bake bread by watching and being taught by

her

> mother. No literacy whatsoever is involved, so this is an

irrelevant red

> herring.
>
> The learning of alphabetic script, however, is a long and

arduous

> process, especially for those already literate in a syllabic script

I have my doubts that it is ever done. I undersand that Chinese
simply memorize how English words are spelled. Those who
aren't as good at sequencing put down all the letters of an
English word with some letters out of order. English literates
also depend on the visual image of the word that they hold in
their head.

I was pulling a certain weed last month that I couldn't remember
the name of. I called it 'k-weed' in my head because I knew it
started with a k. It was knapweed. If I had looked in an English
index for plants I would have easily found it under k not under n.


--

> did you simply skip over all the anecdotes presented here that

support

> the psycholinguistic research? Their syllabary charts are

arranged with

Michael Everson wrote:

> > >> consonants on one axis and vowels on another. In real

books given to

> > > > real children.

> > And the skill isn't that new, because their script has built into

it

> > a pattern which indicates a certain segmentation, and

because their

> > script is presented in syllabary charts. "Hm," says the

learner,

> > "I've forgotten how to write TA. Heres' the T- row, and I follow it
> > over to the -A column....

That is not how Scribner and Cole describe it. This is obviously a
procedure introduced into an English school system to revitalize
native literacy, It is for those who already know the English
alphabet to then learn some Vai. This has little to do with
traditional Vai literacy instruction.

Here are S and C's list of methods, page 67.

"1. Names of things were listed on the page and the student
copied them over, memorizing them as he went.
2. Individual character names were listed, often with the particle
syllable 'me', corresponding to 'this is' appended to it.
3. Strategy 2 was combined with a constraint which listed
characters according to their sound, For example, ... every
person should begin by learning he characters that occur very
frequently,
4. Characters were taught according to their visual form. "

"Teaching characters by form was mentioned frequently with
soemwhat fewer people reporting .... emphasizing the sounds of
characters."

Suzanne