Is the Bush Administration Hooked on Phonics?

Susan B. Neuman, the assistant secretary of elementary and secondary education, wants to get something straight: the Bush administration supports well-balanced programs that incorporate the five essential components of good reading instruction.

"We're certainly not emphasizing phonics-based systems," Neuman emphatically says in response to a January 9 New York Times article that states the administration plans to emphasize phonics instruction over other methods of reading instruction.

Not so, says Neuman, who describes the article as "goofy" and "absolutely incorrect." Instead, she insists, the administration encourages phonemic awareness (the ability to differentiate between similar speech sounds), phonics, fluency, vocabulary, and text comprehension—all the instructional elements backed by the National Reading Panel report of 2000.

Critics of President Bush's wide-ranging education bill, signed into law on January 8, aren't quibbling with the administration's ardent commitment to teaching reading to young children. But they are finding fault with the federal government's alleged preferred method of reading instruction—phonics, which, some educators contend, emphasizes letter-sound relationships at the expense of a child's understanding of the story or text.

The administration has sent educators nationwide approximately 328,000 booklets that summarize the findings of the Congressional National Panel, which two years ago highlighted the importance of phonics in developing successful young readers. While the administration has not mandated the use of phonics instruction, reports the Times, it is requiring that schools use "scientifically based" methods to teach reading.

In July, the National Institute for Literacy hopes to publish a booklet—"almost like a Consumer Reports," says Neuman—that will evaluate the degree to which commonly used reading programs include the essential components of sound reading instruction. Comprehensive reading programs that are used in many of the nation's schools—including those created by educational publishers Scott Foresman, Houghton Mifflin, Harcourt Brace, and Macmillan—will be analyzed.

What role can librarians play in all of this? Neuman encourages school media specialists to take advantage of the recently passed Improving Literacy Through School Libraries Act, also known as the Reed Amendment, which Congress passed in December as an amendment to the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (News, January 2002 ). Although the new law provides only $12.5 million to school libraries for fiscal year 2002—"it's not a great deal of money," admits Neuman—she hopes that librarians will apply for the competitive grants administered by the Department of Education.