Stanislas Dehaene (2009). Reading in the Brain: The New Science of How We Read. New York: Penguin + 388 pp. ISBN: 978‐0‐14‐311805‐3

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• whole-word method should replace or be used in conjunction with phonics, arguing that the whole-word method may in fact inhibit the learning process

• transparent spelling systems

• phonics, the teaching of letter to sound conversion, is supported both by studies of how the brain works and by classroom experiments.

• an expert reader: “a well-read man or woman who implicitly knows a large number of prefixes, roots, and suffixes and effortlessly associates them with both pronunciation and meaning” (p. 204).

• neuronal recycling hypothesis: some neurons in the brain, whose original use was for visual recognition, have been recycled or repurposed for reading.

• the left lateral occipito-temporal sulcus, which Dehaene helpfully refers to as the ‘brain's letterbox’.

• dual-route process: a phonological route (written word to speech via phonemic processing) and a semantic route (processing via the lexicon).

• duality is captured by Dehaene's definition of an expert reader: “a well-read man or woman who implicitly knows a large number of prefixes, roots, and suffixes and effortlessly associates them with both pronunciation and meaning” (p. 204).

• neuronal recycling hypothesis: some neurons in the brain, whose original use was for visual recognition, have been recycled or repurposed for reading

• This hypothesis is in opposition to what he terms the ‘standard social science model’, which views the brain as a ‘blank slate’ without limitations, that can adapt to culture infinitely.

• ame area used for visual recognition of objects,

• drawn from “proto-letters

• human object perception,

• junction lines (for example, where the lines meet on a table) resemble letter shapes such as T, Y, L and F, depending on the angle we view them from

• showing how if these lines are erased, it becomes quite hard to identify the object.

• pictorial, seeing each word as an object; phonological, becoming aware of phonemes; and orthographic, quickly recognising words and their meaning.

• ‘mirror-stage’ that many children go through when learning to write, that is, writing a mirror image of a letter.

• store left and right angle images of any object we see.

• ‘unlearn’ this mirror image when it comes to learning letters.

• phonics is the best method for teaching children to read.