Voice of the Mid-Columbia | Kennewick, Pasco and Richland, Wash. |
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closeIn the 26 years I have taught high school English in Kennewick, I have seen our district make a well-intended and monumental shift towards bringing our low kids up, but there have been side effects. One negative has been the neglect of our students who don't need remediation.
With a mandatory two hours of direct reading instruction daily in our elementary schools, middle and higher-end kids are missing out on an hour of science, geography or the arts. In middle school all the kids lose. The average and above-average kids lose because the arts and technical education have seen a reduction in their resources. The remedial kids lose because in some cases their reading teacher is a displaced art or P.E. teacher.
Such practices produce a dulling effect on our student population. Ironically, putting all the eggs into the "reading basket" in the formative years tends to make kids tapioca readers, writers, and thinkers in high school.
Decoding "Renaissance" or "Socialism" is good work, but what are they? Too many of our teenagers don't have a clue, and that's why I support Uby Creek and a return to a classical education.
KURT CLEMMENS, Burbank
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