In the simplest terms, the whole-language approach strives to teach children to read words as whole pieces of language. Influenced by the Constructivist Theory, proponents of the whole-language methodology believe that children draw from their perspective and prior experiences to form the framework for new knowledge. This form of instruction is taught using a holistic approach, meaning that children do not learn to break down sounds individually but to take words at face value and associate them with prior knowledge. Think of it as the way we learn to speak a language. So, if a child sees the word “dog” written enough times with a picture of a dog he or she will then associate that word, in it’s entirety, with the idea of a dog.