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WINNIPEG FREE PRESS, THURSDAY. MAY .7, 1959U.S. Reading Expert SaysReligion’ba'IMany professional educators are empire-builders of; limited - ability who bitterly resent outside criticism about their . method ^ of teaching reading, • an American professor said here Thursday.Dr, Charles- C. Waleutt. professor of English at Queen’s College, Flushing, New York; an advocate of the phonic method of. teaching reading, said between 40, and 30 per'cent of high school students in the United States could-hot read properly .because they had been taught by the sight method.. The sight method is- in genera! use in Manitoba and lias been championed by Winnipeg education officials..i Dr. Waleutt was to appear before the Manitoba royal commission on education Thursday afternoon and will speak on the teaching. of reading at 8 p.m. in Mulvey School.A RELIGION1 He said many professional educators in the U.S.' looked oh the sight method of leaching reading as a sort' of religion, saw everything in favor of it and could - not see outside it. Teachers were indoctrinated in this viewpoint in their training institutions.- ;. Dr. Waleutt said it is' important that a child learn the alphabet before an atLempt. is made to teach him to read; This was not done by the sight method; which \vent about things backwards, he said. - .'.'You’ve got to begin with theract that .letters' are symbols off sounds. You've got to teach how letters combine to make syllables and • how syllables combine to make sounds,” he said. . PUZZLING' The American professor, -author of Heading: Chaos and Cure, ’.contended the sight method did not include this basic instruction. Consequently, those taught by it were puzzled . when they came acrossan unfamiliar word:' •If this is true, what can Manitoba parents do about it to see their children learn to-.read?Dr. Waleutt says they should teach-their cliild the alphabet before he goes to school'. This would be some measure, of protection against the sight method.ft
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