I guess it amazes me that people find it so interesting — um, no surprise that it really *isn’t* research (check out http://www.snopes.com/language/apocryph/cambridge.asp )
And, of course, the letters being scrambled were actually carefully chosen for the least confusion. NOtice how many critical short words are spelled correctly because they are what helps us predict the flow — it’s the most predictable words that are scrambled.
From “The REading Genie” (you’ve seen me refer to that website a few hundred times ;)):
Reading Education students:
Many of you received the following e-mail that has been making the rounds on the internet:
Aoccdrnig to a rscheearch at an Elingsh uinervtisy, it deosn’t mttaer in waht oredr the ltteers in a wrod are, the olny iprmoetnt tihng is taht frist and lsat ltteer is at the rghit pclae. The rset can be a toatl mses and you can sitll raed it wouthit porbelm. Tihs is bcuseae we do not raed ervey lteter by it slef but the wrod as a wlohe.
Persuasive wasn’t it? However, the claim that “you can sitll raed it wouthit porbelm” is at variance with eye-movement research demonstrating that misspellings slow us down and force us to use contextual guessing.
I also noticed that the spellings within the first and last letters weren’t really a “toatl mses” in some of the words. So I chose a passage with longer words and used a random number program (http://www.random.org/nform.html) to order the inner letters randomly.
Now, see if you can read this second misspelled passage:
The paicuty of dsosiucisn in the lraetruite of theacer rceresah that itnegaorters the use and vluae of dffneriet kdins of cgahne jsteoapuxd wtih the piretssnet epsmhias in the lutrertaie aobut teehcar rerasceh sggetsus the need for onneipg up cnrveitonsaos wiihtn and aorcss cnmmiuetois and ascors the two ltetrueirs aobut what this wrok is for and aubot and how it is rrenesepetd.
You can scroll down for the correctly spelled passage. What I’d like you to do is to forward this second misspelled passage to your e-mail lists to see if we can get the correction to circulate as widely around the internet as the original misinformation.
Cheers,
Dr. Bruce
Bruce Murray, Ph.D.
[email protected]
Reading Genie site: http://www.auburn.edu/~murraba
Problems are opportunities brilliantly disguised as insurmountable barriers.
The paucity of discussion in the literature of teacher research that interrogates the use and value of different kinds of change juxtaposed with the persistent emphasis in the literature about teacher research suggests the need for opening up conversations within and across communities and across the two literatures about what this work is for and about and how it is represented.
Susan L. Lytle, Teacher Research in the Contact Zone, Handbook of Reading Research III, p. 704.
Re: scrambled spelling thing
That message was copied. Bruce did not post it here. It would be neat to have him here, though!
Janis
I had to decode some of these words
British novelist Evelyn Waugh once said, “One forgets words as one forgets names. One’s vocabulary needs constant fertilisation or it will die.” Editors at MSN Learning & Research picked some of their favorite words to nourish your vocabulary. Some of them you may even use. (Tip: Click to see the full definition and hear the word pronounced.)
1. Defenestrate: “throw somebody or something out of window: to throw something or somebody out of a window (formal or humorous)”
It is quite entertaining to defenestrate paper airplanes.
2. Garbology: “study of waste materials: the study of a cultural group by an examination of what it discards”
Garbology might be a good career choice for dumpster divers. Recycling may make the job of future garbologists extremely difficult—they’ll have less to study.
3. Digerati: “computer experts: people who have or claim to have a sophisticated expertise in the area of computers, the Internet, and the World Wide Web”
Not too long ago, computer expertise was considered nerdy. These days, many people strive to be among the digerati.
4. Antipodes:
1. “places at opposite sides of world: places at opposite sides of the world from each other, or the areas at the side of the world opposite from a given place”
2. “opposites: two points, places, or things that are diametrically opposite each other”
One could say that Arthur “Fonzie” Fonzarelli and Warren “Potsie” Weber are antipodes.
5. Hallux: “first digit on the foot: the big toe on the human foot, or the first digit on the hind foot of some mammals, birds, reptiles, and amphibians (technical)”
The ballerina had her hallux insured for $10 million!
6. Otiose:
1. “not effective: with no useful result or practical purpose”
2. “worthless: with little or no value”
3. “lazy: unwilling or uninterested in working or being active (archaic)”
Will e-mail render traditional letter writing otiose? Let’s hope not.
7. Cullet: “glass to be recycled: broken or waste glass returned for recycling”
Don’t forget to take the cullet out to the curbside, and be sure to put it next to the trash, not in it.
8. Pellucid:
1. “clear in meaning: easy to understand or clear in meaning (formal)”
2. “transparent: allowing all or most light to pass through (literary)”
The police officer’s warning was pellucid: drivers must go the speed limit in the school zone.
9. Borborygmus: “stomach rumble: the rumbling sounds made by the movement of gases in the stomach and intestine (technical)”
If you lay your head on someone’s stomach, you are likely to hear borborygmus.
10. Embrangle: “perplex somebody: to confuse, perplex, or entangle somebody or something (archaic)”
As Lord Needlebottom attempted to explain the rules of cricket, his American friends became more and more embrangled.
bruce,
were you at Penn State in the late 60’s and early 70’s as a grad student??
curious, have read some of your studies and remembered a bruce murray at PSU,
dave