Theories of Reading

Phonemes are the basic sounds of a language. Most French programs teach the sounds with an example word, but this is difficult for a foreign ear. Most programs believe that letter-phoneme correspondence should not be taught in isolation because they do not occur in isolation. They therefore teach sounds in conjunction with words. For instance, they teach "b" as in boy or in French they teach "b" as in bateau. Phonemes can change slightly within words, so this type of instruction can cause confusion, especially with the liaison within the French language. Teaching a student the pure sounds allows the child to have a foundation for the sound, and then they carry this knowledge into the slight changes that occur within words. For example, when we teach our children their colors we first teach them a pure blue, red and yellow. We then show them variations of these colors that can still be classified within the name of the color. This is exactly what happens with basic phonemes (phonograms). We teach the pure sound in isolation, and then our brains are able to make the short leaps to the variations within words. This is a very important step if children are to learn how to comprehend aural French without great effort and study.

Our first step is to be able to identify and familiarize our children with the sounds of the french language. Younger children need the first year to just listen to the recordings each week day without the pressure of memorizing the vocabulary. Once they can identify the french sounds and have a good basis in english, then we can start teaching them the French phonograms.

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note: this is part 4 of 7. Have you read part 1?

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