A piece on the importance of phonics and THEN I'll finally get on to teaching in Isaan.

Teaching kids and absolute/false beginners to read using phonics is an opportunity not to be missed.

Forget the fact that you didn't learn about phonics on your TEFL and/or CELTA course.

The method is really easy to pick up, and you'll quickly see the difference that it makes.

The following provides an excellent introduction to teaching phonics; http://www.donpotter.net/PDF/Reading%20Made%20Easy%20with%20Blend%20Phonics%20justified.pdf

What I like about it is it's basic approach. Sure, students like phonics text- and workbooks, BUT are they reading the word from having memorised it previously? Or are they uttering the appropriate sounds to make a word that they already associate with a picture or image? Or are they reading the word using phonics?

The latter option is the only way to go.

Reading is one of the biggest stumbling blocks to learning another language, and phonics helps students to easily master the 70% of English words that can be read by using the method.

Yes, the remaining 30% of words do have to be memorised, but 70% of something is better than 100% of nothing.