Science a GoGo's Home Page Forums General Discussion Not-Quite-Science Forum Can you Read This?

If you can, they say you have a strange mind.
A few people can read this as fast as their normal reading speed. If you can, are you good at map reading or tracing thru a maze, or another attribute?

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! if you can raed tihs forwrad it on.

mike-- There are certainly 2 groups of people who can easily read those examples. Prep teachers (ie teachers of the incoming class of little ones) and Special Ed teachers. Easy Peasy-- and we can read upside down and sideways on.

As to maps. Well no-- not a talent of mine. As far as I can make out north is always at the top of the page-- is it not?

I can read it, but it takes much more effort than regularly spelled writing. I have to decipher each word, which generally impedes me getting the knowledge out of the meaning. I certainly hope it does not catch on as a way to communicate.

I awlys kenw I wsa satrgne. Nwo If I culod olny fnid owt y I am sew srgatne.

Ordinarily, you have to put the first and last letter of each wrod in the right place.

However, With three-letter and two-letter words, I tihnk it iz KO 2 ues eh ltlite i.a.m.g.i.a.n.o.t.i.n.

TH*T RE*L*Y I* AM*Z**G.

It seemed as though I could read it faster than normal !

It was as if my mind stepped into a higher gear ratio.

IMO, tihs iz porbbaly 1 wya 4 uz 2 tlel woh of uz IZ R rirhgt biraend--that is, iamigntiave--cmoaperd wtih tohse of uz who R lfet bniared--that is, logical thinkers.

IMO 2: we need a blanace fo btoh.
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In fact the missing information forces you to read in whole words, rather then in syllables and it forces you to concentrate to understanding - so you can really read faster. But such reading becomes tiresome after while...

No one has mentioned the implication that such a talent for reading seeming gibberish is related to map-reading skills. I DO NOT think it possibly could be, after polling myself in a research study of one, and I would not have thought the two skills were linked. Has anyone a comment on this aspect of this interesting topic?

Zephir, I assume that you agree that any system has its limitations, agreed?

What, in your opinion, are the limitations of the whole-word approach?

map reading , I wouldn't say that my map reading skills
are above average.

tracing thru a maze , here too I wouldn't say that I have above average skills.

I do find myself studying where things are located in stores and what items that stores have in them interest me.

I sort of catalogue the stores items and their locations in case I need to return for more items , I suppose.

especially the stores that have loud music in them.
this may be because I cannot think about the parts I will need to complete a project and often when in lowes for example I must go outside to think about which items I will need.

often I find that I already have the parts I purchased
I just couldn't remember while in the store.

maybe this is a sales tactic , anyway I have plenty of parts to return in the future , just can't ever remember to return them.

Rev-- Do you mind if I barge in on your inquiry to Zephir re. 'whole word' approach to literacy.

I believe it is fact that in a society that has compulsory schooling in a supportive school system with well-trained teachers !(e the likes of Canada and Australia) 80% of children will learn to read without much drama regardless of the tuition system used. Of the remaining 20% about 4% will probably never be able to achieve skills in this area. The remaining 16% will require some intervention, and the basis for this intervention has to be discovering the method that the child (or sometimes adult) prefers to use to learn. Then specially designed programmes can be used in response to the testing results. This is not often something that a busy class teacher can manage as it is an individual assessment and programme, but the techniques can be employed by the teachers and parents once they understand where the problems are.

This is not new. Last century Montessori, whose most influential discovery was that children work best when self-correction is built into their learning, was a huge influence in this area with her discovery that children have different modes of learning, and they should be allowed to experience them all, thus enabling them to have a choice of solutions when self-correcting. A good reader does this automatically from a very early age.

So now, at last, to the whole word approach. This is firstly a visual approach, the mode favoured by the majority of the population. It presumes a backgound in the early learner that is rich in vocab, books and general experiences. Those children do well learning to read--- but-- they would have learned easily by any method, and how many school entrants do not have that ideal pre-school preparation, with a home full of books, music and fulfilling experiences. The whole word method requires, from the beginning, the use of contextual cues (otherwise known as intelligent guessing!), and works best if there is understanding of the possibilities of the context. This is best when the child brings a rich and varied vocab and experience to the reading.

It is best if the whole word method is encouraged along with phonics (for the kids who are auditory learners) , or playing with concrete objects (letters, magnetic and sandpaper for eg) for others who learn best from using tactile materials. Then whole body dance and movement will help children whose kinetic sense is the one they prefer to use for learning. The more differing experiences the better!!

So it is best that all methods should be considered in a class programme for a group of young children.

By the way the example posted by mike illustrates that we here are probably all good visual learners with a strong contextual vocab base! And 2 of us have trouble with maps!

Also--- and this is a personal opinion-- the whole word method DOES NOT help children to learn to spell a non-phonetic language-- the hard yards with phonics has to feature at some stage!!!