Grade 1 books are controversial for ‘teaching the letter P’

Mr. Vinh emphasized that learning all 29 letters, including P, is a mandatory requirement, not to be reduced.

He suggested that the Ministry of Education and relevant agencies request the Vietnam Education Publishing House, specifically the Editor-in-Chief, to immediately supplement and put the letter P back in the book’s table of contents, equal to the letters P. another in the Vietnamese alphabet as prescribed by law.

The first grade Vietnamese textbook series  Connecting knowledge and life on pages 12 and 13 has the entire Vietnamese alphabet printed. P appears in this table. Go to page 64, Ph and Q textbooks; P appears as a component of Ph. However, on page 105, the book mentions the place Sa Pa – there is a word with P in front of a vowel.

The same editor-in-chief, but the 1st grade Vietnamese book in the series Creative Horizons has a whole lesson on the letter P, followed by the letter Ph. Principal Vinh asked the question “So which is the correct one”?

Before the reflections, Prof. Dr. Bui Manh Hung, Editor-in-Chief and Editor-in-Chief of the Vietnamese 1 textbook, “Connecting knowledge with life”, said that it is necessary to distinguish the letter P and the sound P in teaching Vietnamese. He affirmed that the book teaches all 29 letters according to the regulations of the Ministry of Education and Training. This is a “hard” rule, no textbooks can be changed for any reason.

Mr. Hung cited that, in many lessons, students were trained to write the letter P through words such as “flashlight”, “leather bag”, “shark”, “tire”… of volume one and many texts. Another reading of volume two. “Therefore, the idea that Vietnamese 1, the set of  Connecting knowledge to life, does not teach the letter P is completely baseless,” said Mr. Hung.

According to him, the problem is how to teach the sound P, as a consonant. In Vietnamese, the sound P appears mainly at the end of the syllable, in some cases at the beginning of the syllable. Mr. Hung in turn analyzed how to design lessons on these two cases.

First, with words with a P sound appearing at the end. Through the series “ap, ap, ãp”, “op, op, op”, “ep, ep, ip, up” (volume 1) and the words mentioned above, Mr. Hung said that “it can be clearly seen that books that teach the P sound at the end, and teach a lot”.

The second case, when the sound P is at the beginning. Mr. Hung shared, when finishing grade 1, students need to be able to read words like “flashlight”, “Sa Pa”, “Nam Pi”… but the books have different ways of doing it.

“The first way is to teach the P sound in the lesson about the Ph sound. Before learning the Ph, the children practice P, not separately and there is no separate application word for this sound. The second way is to teach the P separately and use the words like “piano” (piano), “pano” (pano) for students to read and develop vocabulary,” said Mr. Hung.

According to him, the Vietnamese 1 textbook of the Ministry of Education and Training (according to the program in 2000) has applied the first method and has become familiar to many teachers. The book series Connecting knowledge to life inherits this teaching method.

“After getting acquainted, learning to read the P sound just before learning the Ph sound, students practice reading the first P sound in some later lessons. For example, when learning the rhyme “in”, they practice reading and writing the word “in”. “flashlight”, practice reading the word “Sa Pa” in a passage about the Northwest”, Mr. Hung cited.

Explaining why he chose this teaching method, Dong Hung said that P and Ph sounds are learned in the negative part, around weeks 5-6 of grade 1. If teaching the P sound separately, it is necessary to have “applied words” to learn. Students learn to read and develop vocabulary. These words must be chosen, based on the previous lessons they have studied. Accordingly, if teaching, the editor is forced to use words like “pi-a-no” (piano), “pano” (pano), cannot use “Sa Pa” or “Nam Pi”.

“Students have not yet learned the S sound in  Sa Pa  and the rhyme “yin” in  Nam Pi. Moreover, usually, proper names are not used in teaching vocabulary development. It’s only 5-6 weeks that students have to read it. and understanding the meaning of words like piano, pano… is not appropriate,” said Mr. Hung.

Regarding the same question, he is the editor-in-chief of two sets of books, but one teaches the P sound separately while the other does not, Dong Hung said that in the series Connecting knowledge with life, he still holds the position of editor, so he should take the initiative. Choose a lesson design. In the series  Creative Horizons, he gave the choice to the editor. Mr. Hung affirmed that the difference is only the way of teaching, there is no right or wrong set of books.

Thanh Hang – Duong Tam