Great Minds

[Amecha]

Only great minds can read this

This is weird, but interesting!

fi yuo cna raed tihs, yuo hvae a sgtrane mnid too

Cna yuo raed tihs? Olny 55 plepoe out of 100 can.

I cdnuolt blveiee taht I cluod aulaclty uesdnatnrd waht I was rdanieg. The phaonmneal pweor of the hmuan mnid, aoccdrnig to a rscheearch at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it dseno't mtaetr in waht oerdr the ltteres in a wrod are, the olny iproamtnt tihng is taht the frsit and lsat ltteer be in the rghit pclae. The rset can be a taotl mses and you can sitll raed it whotuit a pboerlm. Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe. Azanmig huh? Yaeh, and I awlyas tghuhot slpeling was ipmorantt!

[navaer]

lol.. I could read it without probs

[Charys Stormchild]

Easy to read for me...but I've always been a bit strange, hehe

[Velea]

Aaakk... I've been reading internet forums long enough that not only could I read that with ease, I understood it. Though at least I still recognized the errors in it. When I can't, it's time to get offline.

[Takora Drakan]

Hehe could read it with no problems

[Amecha]

It was sent to me in an e-mail, though I have seen it before. I know, I didn't have any trouble whatsoever reading it either. Maybe they just mean seasoned readers can read it. I'm sure someone just barely learning to read would have a lot of difficulty reading it.

[Valornyx]

Actually there is a lot of research around this .. although it is not entirely true... It appears that we can read words fairly easily if the first and last letters are in their right places, but only if other patterns are help within the way the other letters are rearranged.

It is also true that because of the dependency of English on consonant sounds that you can leave out all the vowels and still understand sentences pretty well.

Rsrchrs t cmbrdg fnd tht vwls r lss mprtnt fr nglsh thn cnsnnts.

Although the original email is a little misleading .. almost all native english speakers and a lot of ESL can understand the jumbled forms and most of the research was not in fact done at Cambridge.

[aine]

As a teacher I have seen this several times (at least), usually distributed by those who wish to convince teachers who believe in the integrity of teaching phonetic skills (*raises hand in air and wiggles in her seat* Me! Me!) that teaching the Sight Word method is better (meh).

While I have 5 teaching certificates in Language Arts areas covering kindergarten through 12th grade, with English for Speakers of Other Languages (an unwieldy title, indeed), and Special Education (Gifted, of course, lol) included, I have dug in my heels and refused to complete the three remaining courses that would certify me in Reading grades k-12, so what do I know?

In any event, it is a good demonstration of closure (in psychological terms, as opposed to mathematical or computer programming terms). (If anyone wants to get really sleepy, here is a pretty good article that explains the theories: http://www.aclweb.org/anthology-new/P/P80/P80-1028.pdf ). I still assert that you can’t close the gaps, fill in the blanks unless you once learned what belonged there, but that is a moot point here, I am sure. Unless…anyone want to debate the merits of Whole Language Instruction? *Looks hopeful*. Nah. I thought not.


*Sighs* I am really no fun at all, am I? (Please do not answer).

[Arietna]

I can understand your concern Aine. I am hoping desperately that the schools my children go to do NOT teach phonetics as seems to be the case in some schools around.

If they do, I will be teaching the correct way at home.

(my kids are 2 and 4 and the oldest starts school in September)

[awdz]

It doesn't seem to matter what schools teach, everyone is using im abbreviations for everything anymore. I guess those who did not grow up with cell phone in hand (and therefore insist on traditional spelling & grammar) are stodgy old coots or something.

[velveeta]

and proud of it!

[Velea]

Unless…anyone want to debate the merits of Whole Language Instruction? *Looks hopeful*. Nah. I thought not.

Actually, as a former teacher (though no where near the degrees you have) and mother of three children who learn VERY differently, I've had this debate many many times over. But that would be thread derailing, and I don't want Amarie moderating me, so I'll be good.

[Tcei]

Out of curiosity Aine, I once went (very briefly) to a school where spelling didnt matter, as long as the word looked relatively close. For instance spelling cat as kat, the belief being that it was better to boost the kid's confidence rather than to teach them correctly the first time. After all it's easy to teach them the correct way later... *rolls eyes* Needless to say 15+ years later my spelling is still horrible, even with reading/spelling therapy and a change in schools. Is this somewhat similar to what you are talking about? (Now that I started to ramble?)

A little more on topic I've always found that amusing when ever I see it crop up.

[aine]

I think Whole Language and invented spelling came about at around the same time, and one may have been part of the other...but I am not certain. Whole Language is a nice concept in an ivory tower sort of way. Invented spelling, (read: non-teaching of spelling), however is just plain goofy, I think, hehe. I was lucky enough to have gone to a school that smacked our knuckles if we did not attempt to spell correctly.

But I am the one now derailing (sorry Amecha, no fair after Velea has been so careful to not do so), and we are both showing our ages (similar, I think).

[C`gan]

I've noted in my experience the following snags in teaching:

2, two, to, too. No idea how so many people know so little about when to use what.

here, hear. There's a difference between what your ear does and where you are.

's, s. I know this one is getting taught differently than when I went through school. 's is possessive as well as contractive. So, it is = it's. Ownership by it = it's. Plurals are s. More than one it = its (or these or those).

, and. I don't know who came up with the idea that in a long list of things, the comma is to be dropped before the and. It drives me loony, bonkers, mad, and crazy.

lead, lead, and led. Ok, just because it's spelled the same does not mean it's the same word. You have lead (lead a horse to water) and it's past-tense led (led it there yesterday). Then you have the metal (lead is bad for you).

[Shian]

I grew up reading. ALOT. So I mostly learned to spell (and the differences of two to too) just by writing it out. If it looked odd, I'd try something else until it looked correct.

Augmented by the occassional spelling test, I had a pretty good grip on proper spelling. If my kid ever comes back with a paper written in leet or "lazy writing" by not spelling out "you" "be" "are" etc, he'll be sorry he ever picked up that habit...

[Velea]

This is exactly how my daughter is learning to spell, Shain. She's very artistic and sees the world in what I refer to as "detailed shapes". She can see details, much more so than my either of my boys, in fact, but breaking them down into phonetic parts is very difficult for her. On the other hand, because she is so precise in how something "looks", she's ending up the better speller than my phonics based boys.

Of course, if I'm not careful this is going to lead to my favorite rant about the school system in general and how they all teach tests these days, not children. But again, that's off topic, so I'm not going to... Nope, not at all... not going to do it... wouldn't be prudent.

[Silverblaze]

I run into another problem.

I came just before the IM and the cell phones were common. Didnt have a computer till I was a freshmen in high school.

So my typing skills are abyssmal, but I tend to be a grammar nazi and spell quite well. Punctuation can be problematic however.

As for words only needing to have the first and end letters correct...I'm not so sure.

Pleope aner't lkleiy ot drtemenie wdros peorplry ervey tmie.

Maybe I'm wrong. *shrugs*

What i can't stand is leet....

[Arietna]

I grew up reading. ALOT.

Sorry, couldn't resist. ALOT is not a word. It either needs a space "a lot" or an extra "l" (which of course changes the meaning). One of my pet peeves as an ex- of mine used it all the time

http://www.wsu.edu/~brians/errors/alot.html

[Shur]

I run into another problem.
Pleope aner't lkleiy ot drtemenie wdros peorplry ervey tmie.

i must not be a people then.


;p