I'm being obnoxious, just commming on to think out loud for fun, and not about anything specific, or meaningful in the contect of recording...
If I wer to really *define* what reading means to me, I would say that it's
1) being able to decode phonetically, maybe with some other tools as well, but being able to do this. In a system which does not use phonics, Iwould expect patterns to be recognised (in Chinese, you'd have to be able to use a dictionary to find novel words, maybe relying on a lot of skimming, but using some systematic means, like looking for roots)
2) using text for communication/information gathering
3) derriving pleasure from the process and/or direct result of #2
Three being my "magic line in the sand" -- that's what my DS cant't do yet, and it's the reason, i think, that he doesn't do much of the other two yet. Even if I just ask him to press the fourth floor button, and he loves pressing the button, and reading a single digit number is utterly trivial for him, the looking at the numbers step is one he'd rather skip, and he truly only does it because heknows ifhe's always pusing the wrong button I'll stop lettin him push elevator buttns. A rare success inn external motivation!
But a kid who can only barely read "cat bat hat" by the skin of his teeth, and who enjoys spendingu time sounding it out -- that kid is reading, even if he spent so much effort on the sounds he has no clue what words he jsut read!
