As children, most of us were first exposed to reading when our parents read to us from illustrated storybooks. This is also the method used in the early years of reading lessons in the schools. We all learned our linear reading and writing from nonlinear pictures! But unfortunately the transition from nonlinear pictures to linear writing was not a smooth one. The alphabetic words, bearing no visual resemblance to their associated pictures, fail to make obvious to the minds of young children the nature of the linguistic transformation of information. They can't "see" the pictures of the scene being strung out in a line to form linear sentences.
But with Blissymbols arranged near or on the pictures they refer to, the child can make the association between picture and blissword without any need for wordy explanations. They can "see" that one stands for the other. The first most basic lesson of reading.
Then, when they see those same Blissymbols strung out in lines as linear sentences,
they are able to "consciously" understand this abstraction of whole pictures into "parts along a line".
And they can easily see that there are other ways to string these parts along,
sometimes representing only part of the entire scene.
The world of aviation.
If Bliss were used in the standard education of all children, more of those children would become highly successful readers of their native tongues, having a lifelong, conscious understanding of linguistics. In most adults today, these linguistic concepts are barely understood.
Blissymbolics has already proven successful in transitioning language disabled individuals to reading alphabetic text. If it helps those unable to learn reading at all, how much more might it improve the reading of those who are able to learn. Reading levels have been plummeting in the United States for decades, and no amount of money mindlessly thrown at the problem, or pressure on the kids from "no child left behind testing" has made a difference, except maybe a greater need for prozac to help the kids cope with the increasing pressure.
This "Bliss Transition to Text" approach should certainly be tested in pilot programs around the United States and Europe, and then analyses done to evaluate the effects on reading and writing skills. In the meantime, quality Bliss storybooks will need to be written so that when the politicians or school principals come around, we will have tools ready for them.
Historically, humanity progressed from:
1.
Natural images to cave painting,
2.
Then to pictographic writing,
3.
And then onto alphabetic writing.
We are only asking that educators consider guiding children through the same developmental steps humanity as a whole had to go through. Millennia of human progress from cave painting to alphabetic literacy could be achieved more effectively and decisively in each child from kindergarten to 2nd grade.
Every school teacher knows that a student who skips a grade without sufficient mastery of its lessons begins to falter increasingly as they try to progress in the higher grades. Our kids have been taken abruptly from a state of nature to attempted alphabetic literacy in just 2 grades, kindergarten and 1st grade.
Every psychologist knows that when a person skips a stage of psycho-social development, they will reflexively keep falling back to the missed stage in a subconscious attempt to achieve the missing developmental lessons. And if they fail to achieve it, they risk stagnating at that level for life. Look around, it's been happening to vast numbers of our brothers and sisters.
No species can evolve directly from a state of nature to alphabetic literacy without the intervening pictographic stages of writing. And yet we push our children on to alphabetic literacy skipping at least one of these stages. Why not not take them through each stage consciously, so they won't have to return to earlier grades?
As long as we continue in the old practices, our children will continue to prefer tattoos to reading. And this is not to demean tattoos, the children are merely expressing themselves through the pictographic stage which has been skipped and neglected. In many ways pictographic writing is actually superior. The ability to diagram a concept is proof that the concept is actually understood beyond merely the ability to pronounce a word in the context of a sentence.
For example, mouthing the words "quantum fluctuations can be modified by conscious observation", would not prove I am a quantum physicist or a philosopher. It is just gobble-dee-gook! But if I could fully diagram the concept in front of your eyes while explaining it as I go, you might be convinced of my credentials. It would at least demonstrate that I am using both sides of my brain, and probably the back as well.
Haven't you ever wondered why they say we use only 10% of our brains? Well this is why. We all skipped the 1st grade!
1.
Kindergarten should focus on playing fun, colorful games which begin
connecting pictographs to natural images
which the children are already familiar with.
Children spontaneously draw stick figures at this stage any way.
Blissymbols are really just stick figures drawn consistently.
2.
1st grade should not go straight to memorizing phonetic codes as it does now.
Code should wait until 2nd grade.
1st grade should begin the process of helping children arrange the stick figures from kindergarten
into patterns for telling stories.
Notice that the images and glyphs at the top of this page can be moved around.
In the beginning the children would merely move the glyphs and pictures around to
form various scenes for self expression.
But perhaps by half way through 1st grade, they could begin arranging the pictures and glyphs
in the order in which they speak!
These would be their first linear sentences.
Much practice and experience with both linear and nonlinear expression
should be achieved here for the remaining half year,
and perhaps for an additional year allowing for the full development
of both linear and nonlinear creativity and expression.
3.
Then 2nd or 3rd grade would introduce the phonetic alphabet for representing the sounds of speech.
At this stage of development,
the children would be adequately sophisticated to understand the introduction of code.
And they would see clearly that the alphabet is actually just that: code.
It looks nothing like their thoughts.
They think in pictures!
Wonderful, colorful, simple and sophisticated pictures.
Pictures they themselves helped create.
They already understand sentences and diagrams.
Now they just learn a simple substitution scheme for transcribing the sounds of speech
which have already been flowing out of their mouths now for several years.
26 simple glyphs, each of which mean nothing by themselves.
Now, with significant mastery of all these important levels and types of self expression, the children will sail through the higher grades unhindered by the shortfalls, gaps and scars currently left in our children for life. The higher grades, of course, will explore all the important subjects of life from oceanography to astronomy and everything in between. The ability to communicate and develop their thoughts about these subjects will never be in doubt.
This page is an introduction to a new concept and method for composing Blissymbolics lesson plans:
1.
Pictures associated with Blissymbols in nonlinear scenes.
2.
Complemented by standardized linear Bliss sentences.
3.
And these, often complemented by alphabetic text.
The emphasis is on showing clearly the transitions from:
1.
Picture to pictograph.
2.
Pictographs to pictographic sentences.
3.
Pictographic sentences to strings of alphabetic text.