Covid-19 and systemic racism are creating exponential stress for educators…

Letters in Phonemic Awareness and the Reciprocal Nature of Learning to Read

Tim Shanahan

Teachers’ question:

I’m confused. I’ve heard you say that we should teach phonemic awareness and letters simultaneously. Other “experts” say that phonemic awareness is strictly an auditory skill and that including letters slows children’s learning. Help!

I have some children who, no matter what, don’t seem to be…

--"Once upon a time, schools tried to improve the character of their students. Be neat. Be punctual. Be accurate. Do your homework. Don’t copy anyone else’s work. Dot your is and cross your ts. Remember, practice makes perfect.

"In a similar way, the Boy Scouts urged boys to be little gentlemen. Scout Law dictates: “A Scout is trustworthy, loyal, helpful, friendly, courteous, kind, obedient, cheerful,…

My goal is to help more people understand the reality of our public schools, which are dumb by design. This takes a lot of cleverness. The professors have to design bogus methods that don't teach the subjects they are claimed to teach. Then they have to surround the bogus methods with an impenetrable fog, so that nobody catches on to the damages caused.

These ideas are more fully explained in a new press release:…

Ten years ago, a phonics guru told me that a reading program without cursive is inferior.

He said that mastering cursive accelerates the learning of the letters, which is the critical first step for phonics.

Since that time I've become fascinated by the education establishment's weird hostility to cursive. After all, what is cursive getting in the way of? Not much is being taught in our schools.

I believe that cursive is much more valuable…