Teachers’ opinions of the whole language approach to reading instruction

This article reports the findings of a study of the opinions of first- and first/second-grade teachers of certain comments made about the whole language approach to reading instruction by leading advocates of this procedure. The investigation revealed that these teachers rejected as “false” more of these comments about the whole language approach than they accepted as “true.” The findings of this study, apparently the first of their kind that have been reported, suggest that less progress has been made in persuading teachers that the whole language approach to reading instruction is the preferred teaching procedure than some leaders of the whole language movement previously have claimed.