According to whole language philosophy, language should not be separated into component skills, but rather experienced as an integrated system of communication. Whole language has been characterized as encouraging children to guess at the pronunciation of words rather than focusing on phonics or memorization.
The components of a whole language literacy program include
Critics of "whole language" maintain that it is less effective than the traditional phonics-based approach. Proponents maintain that it does incorporate phonics. It has also been noted that non-alphabetic languages can only be taught "whole language", one pictogram or character at a time.
It has also been noted that although people really do read on whole language principles, some believe that you first must learn how to read phonetically before naturally progressing to reading whole words and concepts rather than letters and sounds, which happens to almost all effective readers.
Arguing against the pictographic point of view aforementioned, some employ the following simile: teaching a phonetic language using Whole Language is like teaching people to read Chinese without teaching them how to write the letters. This would, they hold, hamper one's ability to remember and distinguish between letters.