The reason for returning to the UK this summer was to complete my MA in International Education which i´m doing through Oxford Brookes University. It has been a long struggle, but the end is well in sight.
It seems appropriate to be working on this in Dharamsala - after all, it´s very name nae translates as "the home of learning".
My Masters thesis looks at young students´ acquisition of reading and spelling skills. Yes..pretty worthwhile methinks!
It is a case study on an accelerated phonics programme – known as “synthetic phonics”. Original research was started in Scotland, and following it´s successes, has now been adopted in the English National Curriculum in the new Literacy Strategy.
I am looking for patterns in an International setting where students often have English as a Second or additional language. Indeed these Hong Kong-based students were in some cases being exposed to a romanised alphabetic system for the first time.
Initial analysis of the data show that these four and five year old International students were on average 13 months in advance of students in Australia in both reading and spelling. Interesting stuff indeed!
It does however encroach on what was labelled “The Great Debate” which has been raging for over 70 years - phonics or Whole-Language approach? The pendulum has swung slowly across the spectrum there and back again. Unfortunately I have no choice but confront this knot and strip it bare. Not so easy – who am I to settle this argument?
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