The principles behind ‘synthetic phonics’, the latest educational reading nostrum, have been around for thousands of years. Heaps of papyrus exercises, exercise-books (and a primary school textbook) have been found, dating from the Greek world of the 5th century bc.
The first thing to be learnt was the Greek alphabet, by means of a metrical, chanted song: est’ alpha, beta, gamma, delta, t’ ei te kai / z
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