The Education-Reform Carousel
June 28, 2023 4:13 pm ET A student wears a mask while reading a book at school in Provo, Utah, Aug. 20, 2020. Photo: George Frey/Bloomberg News I have a big smile on my face after reading Eva Moskowitz’s “Phonics Finally Gets Its Due in New York” (Cross Country, June 24). My mother, a 1950 home-economics graduate, taught me and my three brothers all to read using phonics—before we entered first grade. My mother then went back to school in her 40s and became a primary teacher. Her motto was, simply, “Once you can read, you can do anything.” What I find tragic today is knowing that this too shall pass. It seems that even when we can read, we fail to read history. What we have learned about how reading is taught will all be forgotten after another generation determines that this “old way” isn’t good enough. Then we may have to wait another 20 years to rediscove
A student wears a mask while reading a book at school in Provo, Utah, Aug. 20, 2020.
Photo: George Frey/Bloomberg News
I have a big smile on my face after reading Eva Moskowitz’s “Phonics Finally Gets Its Due in New York” (Cross Country, June 24). My mother, a 1950 home-economics graduate, taught me and my three brothers all to read using phonics—before we entered first grade. My mother then went back to school in her 40s and became a primary teacher. Her motto was, simply, “Once you can read, you can do anything.”
What I find tragic today is knowing that this too shall pass. It seems that even when we can read, we fail to read history. What we have learned about how reading is taught will all be forgotten after another generation determines that this “old way” isn’t good enough. Then we may have to wait another 20 years to rediscover phonics, once again.
Megan Reid
Pasco, Wash.
Now that New York City’s schools chancellor has apologized to parents on the matter of reading instruction, I can’t help but wonder if our public schools will be issuing another apology 20 years from now: for teaching critical race theory to our children.
John Cugia
Concord, Calif.
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