When my brother was learning to read they were using phonics. He put so much effort into the sounds and pronunciation that he missed the actual meaning of the word, which the teachers also missed reinforcing. I would help him while he read aloud and was shocked at how little he understood. "What does that mean?" I wish they'd put half as much effort into vocabulary and comprehension as they did phonics. To this day he still struggles with comprehension and has dropped out of college because the classes were too 'book heavy'.
Luckily, with my deaf daughter, i won't have a problem with that. We've already cut articulation and phonics out of her IEP. Site reading is her only option. Little worried about my older daughter though. May end up teaching reading properly at home.
