Reading--the grand illusion : how and why people make sense of print / Ken Goodman, Peter H. Fries, Steven L. Strauss.

Format:

• Book

Author/Creator:

• Goodman, Kenneth S., author.
• Fries, Peter Howard, author.
• Strauss, Steven L., author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

• Reading.
• Language and education.

Physical Description:

xxi, 164 pages ; 24 cm

Place of Publication:

New York, NY : Routledge, 2016.

Summary:

What is reading? In this groundbreaking book, esteemed researchers Ken Goodman, Peter H. Fries, and Steven L. Strauss explain not only what reading really is but also why common sense makes it seem to be something quite different from that reality. How can this grand illusion be explained? That is the purpose of this book. As the authors show, unraveling the secrets of the grand illusion of reading teaches about far more than reading itself, but also about how remarkable human language is, how the brain uses language to navigate the world, what it means to be human. Each author brings a different perspective, but all share a common view of the reading process. Together they provide a clear and surprising exposition of the reading process, in which they involve readers of this book in exploring the ways they themselves read and make sense of written language while their eyes fixate on fewer than 70 percent of the words in the text. In addition, the authors engage in a cross-disciplinary discussion about how readers use the brain, eyes, and language in reading. The different perspectives provide depth to the authors description of reading. The information presented in this book will be new to many teachers, researchers, teacher educators, and the public alike. The final chapter draws on the understandings from the book to challenge the treatment of reading and writing as school subjects and offers the basis for supporting literacy development as a natural extension of oral language development. Book jacket.

Contents:

• 1 Illusions: What We See and What We Perceive 1
• Language: Our Most Human Characteristic 1
• Reading Is Language 2
• The Illusion of Reading Every Word 3
• Limitations of Our Senses and illusions of the Human Brain 4
• On Seeing and Knowing 7
• References 13
• 2 The Grand Illusion in Reading 15
• Illusions and the Grand illusion 16
• Vision and Perception in Reading: Learning and Reading with EMMA 20
• Language Patterns and Eye Movements 27
• How Does Knowledge of Language Help Us to Understand Reading? 31
• References 32
• 3 Reading with Our Brains 34
• Consistency of Our View of Reading with Developing Brain Theory 35
• Making Sense Is the Preferred State of the Human Brain 36
• Making Sense Is Itself an Illusion 37
• A New Paradigm: The Neuroscience of Constructive Psychology 38
• What Does It Mean for the Brain to be Focused? 42
• It's the Cortex that Makes Sense! 47
• Convergence 49
• Who Denies Biology? 49
• References 56
• 4 Making Sense: What We Know about Reading 58
• Miscue Research: Windows on the Reading Process 58
• Reading Is a Process of Making Sense of Print 65
• Intuition: Reading as a Psycholinguistic Guessing Game 70
• Reading is Cyclical 71
• The Need for Real Language 76
• So Let Me Review What We Have Learned about Reading 76
• References 78
• 5 Text Features that Help Readers Make Sense 80
• But Where Is the Meaning? 80
• How Texts Convey Meaning 83
• References 102
• 6 Words on Words and Wording 103
• The Wording of Texts: What Counts as a Word? 104
• The Wording of a Particular Text 109
• Interdependence of Grammar and Word Choice in Wording of Texts 115
• Efficiency in Wording 117
• How Text Complexity Is Reflected in Miscues 118
• So What Makes a Text Comprehensible? 122
• The Brain Functions Holistically 123
• References 125
• 7 The Visible Level of Written Language: The Graphophonic 127
• Whole to Part and Part to Whole 127
• Phonics: The Over-Simplification Illusion 128
• Seven, Plus or Minus Two 132
• Punctuation 136
• Readability 137
• References 137
• 8 Literacy for the Twenty-First Century and Beyond 138
• Focus on Learning 138
• Learning to Read and Write is Easy 139
• A Bold Proposal 140
• Achieving in School What Children are Already Achieving Outside of School 146
• And a Motto for the Kids: When in Doubt, Figure it Out! 149
• Connecting to Culture 149
• Time for Language Development 150
• The Role of the Teacher 151
• Whole Language 153
• Manufactured Crisis 154
• Revaluing 156
• Access is a Key Aspect of All Kinds of Language Development 157
• The Future of Literacy 158.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN:

• 9781138999282
• 1138999288
• 9781138999299
• 1138999296

OCLC:

915135726