Malay Phonics -A Reminder on Balanced Approach
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Malay phonics is only a means to enable a child to acquire reading skill.
A Human Miracle
No other creatures scientifically classified as " intelligent " can learn to read as a human child does.As early as one year old, a baby's brain begins to make sense of the connection between word and sound, even the emotion attached to reading!Some children are endowed with incredible capability that they can intuit phonetic rules by just reading to them.
Ah...Uniqueness of a human child. This is something I never say to the children that I worked with. Each time as they improve in reading, I am astounded by how much their little brains are able to grasp: the complexity of human language, perception of the world through written codes and tones of emotions according to punctuations.
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Key to Quality Learning
Why is it important for a child to master a language?
"The quality of an individual's thought will depend upon the quality of his language. Language, is indeed, in the center of the stage as a far as learning and intelligence are concerned." - Dorothy Butler, author of Babies Need Books.Yes,when a child reads well, he can pick up more information in his language thus improving the quality of learning.
Malay Phonics or, No Phonics?
As a child, I learnt mainly through what they call the "see and say" method, i.e. I recognize whole words and I am bot bothered about deciphering individual letters and syllables.However, with Bahasa Malaysia, I rarely confuse similar-looking words or not able to read new words. This is due to my honourable mother, despite limited in her education and resources, did her best to instil the love for reading in me by providing sufficient interesting reading materials.
Nowadays, the very high academic standard of Bahasa Malaysia is a challenge for average children. When a child is expected to read hard-to-digest passages full of ambiguous passive voices at the age of 7 and write analysis by the time he is 10, he has to be at least a good reader.Hence, the education system in Malaysia makes it inadequate to rely on " see and say " method alone. Consider the facts below:
It is estimated that the " see and say " method enables a child to recognize a total of 4,200 words by the time he completes the fourth grade. In comparison, within the same duration, he recognizes 40,000 words using the phonics method.I don't think you need to be a genius to figure out which method can help a child to learn Bahasa Malaysia better.
Balance
My personal opinion is: Malay phonics enables a child to read with ease the vast amount of vocabulary required by the education system. Thus the child can devote his mental effort to meaning and comprehension.Yeap...Wan is not a phonics fanatic. I prefer a combination of phonics first, followed by "see and say" method, which ultimately achieve the goal of reading for the sake of understanding.
| Malay Phonics Exercise for S |
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rice sisi beside basi stale Nasi di sisi Susi basi. The rice beside Susi is stale | Deer merasa to taste sesudu a spoon of susu milk Rusa merasa sesudu susu. The deer tastes a spoon of milk. |
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| Malay Phonics Exercise for Z | |
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pizza-lahh lazat delicious berzat nutritious Piza Zorro lazat dan berzat Zorro's pizza's delicious and nutritious | music Jaz jazz Muzik jazz Aziz Aziz's jazz music. |
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