[justin66]

I'll certainly review the podcast when I have time. Thanks!

I read Pournelle's column in Byte in the late eighties and at times he bemoaned the lack of phonics in modern reading curriculum while also pumping his wife's expensive phonics-based reading software. I ran this by teachers I knew and the general response I got was a confirmation that teachers use phonics all the time, along with some frustration about the rather common misunderstanding, which is at times promoted by people with their own agendas.

As someone who knows teachers but doesn't have kids and has not been motivated to learn a lot about this stuff, I've found that the above pattern often holds. Teachers baffled and annoyed by the misunderstanding of what they're doing with regard to phonics, a somewhat political origin of the critique of reading education from people who are inclined to criticize public education more broadly, sometimes there's a product to sell...

Dealing with "phonics parents" who have bought into this is probably a bit surreal and frustrating. "You've spent time working with your child on lessons outside the classroom and they've displayed improvement? What an important and forgotten education principle you've discovered."

[ch4s3]

I went through school in the 90s and was 100% not taught any method involving phonics or sounding out words. None of the kids whose parents didn't read to them could read well by 3rd or 4th grade.

Moreover it is factual that universities instructing teachers were for decades only teaching the whole language approach. Implementation varied state to state, but you can literally look at curriculum material used in various states over time and see the shift.

The problem was in fact the reverse of what you're claiming, whole language was brought in by consultants selling a curriculum. This is also easily confirmed.

I also know some teachers, but that's just anecdote and fairly parochial.

[justin66]

> I went through school in the 90s and was 100% not taught any method involving phonics or sounding out words.

I mean... would you remember? Pretty much the only thing I remember about the relevant early years of kindergarten and elementary school is the time I went to school sick and threw up on my desk. (then again, I'm old)

> The problem was in fact the reverse of what you're claiming, whole language was brought in by consultants selling a curriculum. This is also easily confirmed.

I actually have no idea how to confirm that, but I'm sort of willing to take your word for it. By contrast, it's easy to find the phonics lesson products that are sold to parents, like the one I mentioned in my post. Such products used to be pumped on the ads during AM hate radio shows, among other things. Those products were complimentary to the "educators are terrible and public education is terrible and everything done by experts is terrible" message those shows pushed.

To be clear, I don't think those lessons are necessarily useless. Time spent with kids outside class on their education is a positive thing.

> Implementation varied state to state

I'm sure that accounts for a lot of the difference in lesson plans we're talking about, and some states emphasize strong local control as well.