The Best of Both Worlds

By Karen Diegmueller

Jack sits at his desk and ponders the worksheet exercises his teacher has handed out: Circle all the words on the page that contain the same "at" sound. After 20 minutes, Jack's teacher collects the worksheets and hands out a new set with a similar task. When that work is completed, the class moves on to a science lesson.

In Jill's 1st-grade classroom, the children sit on the floor around their teacher as she reads aloud to them. Upon finishing the story, Jill's teacher instructs the students to return to their desks and spend 20 minutes writing about the topic of their choice.

The two teachers use two markedly different approaches to teach their young charges how to read. The first, explicit decoding instruction, is known in shorthand as phonics or basic-skills instruction. The second is called whole-language instruction. Together, they have incited the great reading war that has raged in education circles for...