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文章連結： https://tw.voicetube.com/videos/27821

My first book I've ever read was Hop on Pop by Dr. Suess, but what was going on in my brain
when I was learning to read?
Hey guys. Julia here for DNews
According to a study by the Department of Education and the National Institute of Literacy
32 million American adults can’t read. More than most developed nations, so what’s going on?
Is our education system failing us? Or is it our language?
Here in the states most students begin to learn to read in kindergarten, learning the
alphabet, turning those letters into sounds and then working their way up to whole words.
But learning to read is a very long complicated process.
One of the keys to being able to read is Automatic word processing. It’s basically how the
brain decides a group of symbols is actually a word within milliseconds.
One study published in the journal Developmental Science found that this process happens around
fourth and fifth grade. But for some the process is much longer.
Researchers had participants look at a list of words, fake words that looked like real words,
and strings of random symbols. They found that for most people, no matter their
age knew the difference between real words and not. But after placing an electrode cap
on participants heads, the researchers learned how people subconsciously react to words and symbols.
They found that college kids could instantly tell the difference but surprisingly
elementary school students still respond to random symbols as words even as late as 5th grade.
So this experiment was designed to test Automatic word processing. So your brain reads these symbols as words,
which it reads not based on its individual parts or letters,
but based on how it looks as a whole. You’ve seen that mean going around, that if all the letters are
mixed up in a word you can still read it. While most of that post is just Internet baloney,
it does have some truth to it. Your brain can read words as a single object
rather than a string of letters put together.
A study published in the Journal of Neuroscience found that there’s a small area of the brain,
on the left side of the visual cortex, that can “read” words. Basically
this part of the brain sits right next to the part that recognizes faces. So one area of the
visual cortex can quickly identify a face, another can quickly read a word.
But when is the best time to learn to read? Well there’s a crucial window between kindergarten and third grade.
Research published in the journal Psychological Science found that
the amount of white matter growth in the temporoparietal region during that window strongly predicted
how well that kid would learn to read. It didn’t matter so much as to what their home life
was like or their genetic predisposition was. This area of the brain is super important
for things like phonological processing, speech, and reading. One of the lead researchers,
Fumiko Hoeft, thinks that if the growth in this part of the brain doesn’t happen at the right time,
the kid could have problems with reading.
But the problem with our literacy rate might have more to do with our language than with
our educational system or our brains. English is one of the most irregular languages. Words
more often break rules than conform. So learning to read and write becomes a matter of memorizing
words which can take years and years. Other languages it can only take a year, because
they have a written language that follows rules. So if a person comes across a new word
they haven’t heard before, they can pretty much figure out how to spell it.
In English, "read" and "read" mean two different things but are spelled the exact same way.
COME ON ENGLISH WHY. Apparently I am not the only one who questions this, from
Benjamin Franklin’s phonetic alphabet to an entirely new system called Unspell which
looks like squiggly lines to me, there’s been plenty of attempts to reform the written language
over the years. Will it happen anytime soon? Probably not.
Speaking of reading, while it may be one of the best pastimes around, it’s sometimes
considered one of the most dangerous. In Nazi Germany, thousands of books were burned in
an attempt to control the minds of their people. To find out about a touching memorial to all
the lost books, check out this great episode from our sister show Seeker.
So what do you think? Is English due for an overhaul? What was it like for you when you


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大綱：
They found that college kids could instantly tell the difference but surprisingly
elementary school students still respond to random symbols as words even as late as 5th grade.
So this experiment was designed to test Automatic word processing. So your brain reads these symbols as words,
which it reads not based on its individual parts or letters,
but based on how it looks as a whole.
簡單來說看文字並非單一以字母來判讀，而是以整體單字來判斷，正如同：漢字序順並不定一影閱響讀。

Research published in the journal Psychological Science found that
the amount of white matter growth in the temporoparietal region during that window strongly predicted
how well that kid would learn to read. It didn’t matter so much as to what their home life
was like or their genetic predisposition was. This area of the brain is super important
for things like phonological processing, speech, and reading. One of the lead researchers,
Fumiko Hoeft, thinks that if the growth in this part of the brain doesn’t happen at the right time,
the kid could have problems with reading.

幼稚園到三年級，大量的白質在顳區發展，關連到小孩子的閱讀能力發展。並非是基因的影響，和家庭因素。
但是幼兒方面的訓練有很大的關聯(環境)，所以那段時間不發展起來就有很大的閱讀障礙。


English is one of the most irregular languages. Words
more often break rules than conform. So learning to read and write becomes a matter of memorizing
words which can take years and years.

她講得有道理，英文本身就是不規則的語言，但是不太認同其它語言可以學一年。
因為只要是人類語言，都很難有它的規則，除非是程式語言。因為程式語言重視邏輯並且是少部分人發展出來的規則，
人類語言是大多數人發展出來的溝通語言，固然很難有規則。


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單字：

literacy : the ability to read and write.
literacy rate.
irregular: contrary to the rules.
English is one of the most irregular languages.
conform  : comply with rules.
figure out : to calculate , to understand.
apparently : obviously , clearly.
attempts : trying to achieve something. (vt)(n)
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※ 作者: chinagogoya 時間: 2015-11-21 12:14:07
※ 編輯: chinagogoya 時間: 2016-04-20 09:42:24