Also, what's the threshold for Special Ed, and are any such students exempt from testing? However, I don't doubt that extra time training teachers to teach pho

Also, what's the threshold for Special Ed, and are any such students exempt from testing? However, I don't doubt that extra time training teachers to teach phonics would help their students turn those letters on the page into sensible sounds, and I'm happy for the students that seem to be helped here. My mother was a middle (and then high) school Spanish teacher, and her favorite party trick for her new students was to promise them that within the first week, they'd be able to read out most Spanish text put in front of them (albeit with a horrible accent). English pronunciation is notoriously inconsistent; Spanish is particularly consistent. I'd love to know how long schools in Spanish-speaking countries spend on basic "pronounce the words on the page" level literacy compared to English-speaking ones.