Not Your Average Spanish Class

Opaque Scripts

• Writing systems where the sound is not obvious
• Here, "obvious to learners"

True opaque scripts

• No sound information at all
• Chinese, hieroglyphics

Semi-opaque systems

• Japanese (kanji + kana)
• Adult versions use furigana at times

Might-as-well-be

• Hebrew, Arabic (no vowels, unfamiliar phonetic marks)
• Cyrillic, other alphabets
• French, Welsh, etc.
• Pinyin, romaji, Spanish

For Opaque Scripts

• No sound information
• Readable without fluency

Symbol sentence example here

Fluent readers

• Don't sound out every word
• Recognize "chunks" of language

Untitled Slide