My sainted mother was a former educator. She taught me phonics. I read before I was 2.
She insisted I have end of career teachers in grade school. They taught sentence diagramming and hard core grammar.
I also had to take Latin, but I had started learning languages at about age 5.
I recommend all these practices to any educator/parent reading this post.
I am living proof that all this stuff works.
Oh, and at age 12 I went through a speed reading course while at school.
That works, too. When in college, I used to be asked how I kept up with the reading.
I am currently struggling with being a conservative and a public school teacher. It is something I question every day, but at the end of every day I see that it is teachers like me that have to keep fighting the good fight. I teach my students that the Constitution is not a living document (as their text claims) and I take my Sharpie with me to the staff powder room where all of the union propaganda is posted. My son is three and a half years old and my daughter is eight months old. We are currently homeschooling and will probably continue to do so.