That's simply not true, fortunately. All public schools are to follow common core standards and that includes phonics (sounding out words) over sight words and certainly over context guessing. Going contrary to the core is possible, I guess, but certainly not the norm.

If you're curious, the debate was mostly settled in the 90s, during what my PhD advisor called the "reading wars." Well, mostly settled... sight words still have a place in reading, especially when a word is contrary to its phonics. But basically, policy has prioritized phonics since Clinton, with to only some revision under Obama.

That's not to say Americans aren't dumb; doesn't mean much if standards aren't met. But it's not as simple as saying we're taught incorrectly. I could give a variety of reasons, although Lemmy users can probably guess poverty, politics and capitalism are pretty central to a lot of it.

Always remember when discussing with US citizens:

Only 13% of the population is proficient in each of these three areas—able to compare viewpoints in two editorials; interpret a table about blood pressure, age, and physical activity; or compute and compare the cost per ounce of food items.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Functional_illiteracy -> second to last paragraph of the first part.

i lived in california from ages 4-8 and we did phonics basically every grade level.

i moved to florida about 3/4 through 3rd grade and that was when i learned about educational standards at the ripe old age of 8 when everyone in my new third grade class read at a first grade level and even my teacher didn't seem to know what she was doing.

i have a formative memory from my first day. i asked the kid next to me when recess is, and his response was, "what's recess?"

I’m thankful every day for my kid’s Montessori school. 5 years old and I’m already to the point where we read together every night for fun, but I’m not really needed. Sometimes I see the reading light on after bedtime, but I let it slip. 🥹

(I did make another comment but I was being a little silly)

It's pretty insane to me that they don't teach phonics, since that's very important to actually reading a word, especially aloud. In my original comment I was ignoring that reading included determining the meaning of a word, but I was conflating reading with only reading aloud or simply identifying a word.

Three cueing can be important to reading and would probably help out on the spot, but is something I (and I assume many others) picked up naturally anyway from just reading a lot. I don't expect it to be taught in school instead of phonics, and it should not replace just looking up a word in the dictionary. This just seems absolutely absurd to me.

That is...concerning.

I kinda like to play with writing systems, like Avatarian (Script made for Avatar Legend of Aang and Seven Havens), where each glyph is mapped onto a sound in US English IPA rather than just redesigning glyphs in the Latin Alphabet and I sometimes wonder if it would've been better if we had this system (with glyphs for "ch" and "Ll" of course).

Now reading that I think it might be a better system.

Sadly, the generation was lost to the war on drugs. We were overzealous and refused to let them even get Hooked on Phonics.

I learn new words by searching for the definition. Is that not a thing anymore? You don't have to go find a dictionary anymore. You can literally pull out your phone and type: "define xxx". I really hate our education system.

Parents are both overworked and lazy here in the States, are you surprised our education is faltering? This is by conservative design, the schools are defunded, teachers underpaid, schools are understaffed, under supplied and corrupt. The conservatives want the poor to be their new slaves, and the conservatives need them dumb enough to keep voting for them until the conservatives take that away too.

We're a powder keg waiting to explode while being manipulated and having access to all kinds of guns, at some point things are going to explode, or we'll just boil like the frog.

The counterargument is that English is uniquely bad for phonetical spelling.

Never make fun of someone who says a word strangely. They may have only ever read it.

I’m not sure that phonics is the underlying reason American people don’t learn to read. I think there’s deep complex reasons for that.

My mother was a learning disabilities teacher consultant and hated 3 cuing. Most students sent to her once it started were fine when taught not that way.

moth has younglings, and they definitely were taught to sound out words that can be. some words cannot be sounded out, those are called sight words. moth supposes that this isn't something that's nationwide.

What's the alternative?? Just telling them?

I'm in my mid 40's and American, and I was taught to figure out word meanings from context clues back in elementary school. This isn't a new thing.