While I agree to a certain extent, I have to say that I learned to write by reading and hearing books read. My grandmother read to me from books, real books, not Dick and Jane, from the time I was a toddler. When I hit school, my big trauma was getting enough of the mechanics (of physically writing) down to be able to express my thoughts. I had my family in stitches many, many times with my creative spelling. If I didn’t know the word, I sounded it out – and who came up with that crap idea in a language like English with more irregular spellings than any other??? – and went on with the thought. My sentences were long and complex, well beyond my school grade, because that’s the kind of sentences I’d been hearing for as long as I could remember.
Let’s hear it for literacy programs that promote reading to kids, with the caveat that we give them stuff that will stretch their little minds, not anesthetize them.
Stepping away from the pulpit. Ohmmm. \;+)