Rethinking Dyslexia: The Hidden Trap of Extraneous Sounds in English Phonics

 

For over a decade, starting in 2010, I challenged the prevailing 50-year-old theory that phonological awareness deficits cause dyslexia. Through more than 100 social media comments and articles, I argued against this consensus—only to face widespread rejection. Educators dismissed my views, and many blocked me outright. The irony? In an era of information overload, critical thinking seemed scarce.

 

My reasoning was straightforward, drawn from direct experience of teaching kids classified as dyslexic. All my students could read fluently in Malay, and those from vernacular schools excelled in Pinyin (Mandarin romanization). Yet, they struggled with English. If phonological awareness were truly the root issue, how could they decode other languages so effortlessly? Clearly, the problem lay elsewhere.

Shifting focus, I observed my students closely and asked probing questions. The breakthrough came: English letter sounds were being taught with unnecessary "extraneous" endings—like "fuh" for /f/, "ah" for /a/, and "tuh" for /t/ when sounding out "fat." These distortions confused learners, turning simple blending into a cognitive hurdle. Once I corrected this—teaching pure, isolated sounds without the extras—reading clicked. My students progressed rapidly, thriving not just in school but later in universities.

Why, then, did so many educators and researchers resist? It hit me: Most belong to the 60% who "cracked the code" despite these flawed methods, adapting through sheer resilience and spending years to figure out the code.  

As Charlie Munger wisely observed, once an idea lodges in the mind, a rival one struggles to take root—no matter the evidence.

Proof abounds in testimonials from parents, shared in my blog posts [LINK]. Overseas voices echo this too, including one from Australian on a Tweet thread [LINK] and another from California [LINK]. Yet, the field persists in chasing phantom causes for why bright children falter in reading, overlooking this fixable flaw at the heart of phonics instruction. It's time to listen, adapt, and empower every learner.