Education Hearing LR202
- Lisa (Admin)
- Oct 29
- 5 min read
My Views Are My Own
By Lisa Schonhoff, Ed.S.
10/29/2025
Yesterday, I had the opportunity to share my views regarding literacy in Nebraska with lawmakers during an interim study hearing. You may view my testimony below:
Opening Statement
My name is Lisa Schonhoff. I would like to thank you all for your work. It’s an honor to be here. My views are my own and a result of my extensive experience in education. I have been an educator for more than 25 years. I have three degrees in education. Over the past twenty-five years, I have been a first grade teacher, third grade teacher, Instructional Coach for Literacy and Math, an instructor for college courses for teachers, a beginning teacher mentor, and a K-12 EL teacher and coordinator. I am very passionate about literacy and have devoted my career to researching best practice for teaching kids to read.
NAEP Data
My greatest concern is that we have far too many children not reading at proficient levels in our state. I have provided the National Report Card for literacy data for Nebraska. If you look at the 4th Grade Reading page that says Average Scale Scores, look halfway down the page and look at the row that says 2024, you will see that Nebraska has 22% of fourth graders reading at a proficient level and 6% of fourth graders are advanced. This gives us a total of 28% of our fourth graders reading at or above a proficient level. When you look at 8th grade reading on the other side, you can see that we have a total of 27% of our 8th graders reading at a proficient level. This means we have well over half of our students in Nebraska NOT reading at a proficient level, according to the only test that is taken in every state across our nation. You can see on the state rankings page that there are 36 states doing better than us in 4th grade reading and 28 states doing better than us in 8th grade reading. Getting kids to read is nonpartisan and should be a top priority for every educator and lawmaker in the state.
Whole Language, SoR, Phonics
Let’s take a brief look at what has led us to this point. I received my first education degree in 2001. In 1999, a well-known educator publication called ASCD, published an article called Whole Language Works: Sixty Years of Research, “Whole Language offers a comprehensive reading and writing program for all children, from prereaders to students throughout their school years.” Because of this vast evidence and research, teachers were told for decades to avoid phonics and teach the whole language approach. I almost quit teaching my first year because of it. Luckily, I had administrators who allowed me the autonomy to do my own research so that I could learn the best reading strategies for students. It’s now been 25 years and I’m still seeing so many of the same mistakes being made.
While I find it exciting that we are placing a great deal of emphasis on the Science of Reading and getting phonics back into our classrooms, I want to be clear that this alone will not solve our literacy crisis. The Science of Reading is far too broad of a term. The Nebraska Department of Education defines the Science of Reading as:
“...a vast, interdisciplinary body of scientifically-based research about reading and issues related to reading and writing. This research has been conducted over the last five decades across the world, and it is derived from thousands of studies conducted in multiple languages…” (The Reading League)
As you can see, this definition has great potential to cause confusion amongst educators across our state. It could potentially be as confusing as the research that pushed us toward the whole language approach in the 90s.
Education Preparation Programs
Our top priority needs to be evaluating the education preparation programs in our state to ensure our educators are getting adequate hours of effective literacy instruction so that we do not need to rely on curriculum makers to train our educators. (Maybe we need to consider getting rid of content that keeps our educators from learning essential literacy content.)
*As far as legislation goes, I would warn against banning specific teaching strategies. If we think back to 1999, it is clear that it would have been a detrimental mistake to ban phonics in the classroom. I would be leery to BAN almost anything.
Screen Time
IF we are looking into banning anything, my suggestion would be to look at the copious amounts of research that shows what screen time in our classrooms is doing to developing brains. Using screens instead of pencils, paper, and books, is proving to have a negative impact on students' reading stamina, attention span, and overall academic performance.
School Districts across our state have been using curriculum materials such as Wonders, that rely on short, fragmented stories instead of entire books. Even worse, now we are spending millions of dollars per district on materials that keep kids on screens instead of in books. No matter how much time and energy we spend on training our educators in structured phonics and the Science of Reading, while we may see short term gains from reintroducing phonics into classrooms, we need to remain cautious about the long-term impact of these controversial curriculum materials. Let’s get physical books back into the hands of our students!
Mississippi
I also think it’s important to look at what other states are doing that are showing gains in literacy. Most have heard of the Mississippi Miracle. While I’m sure they have a lot of great things happening, and I’m meeting with their literacy experts TOMORROW to learn more, after scouring through their Department of Education website, one of the starkest differences I’m seeing with that state is their accountability. Students who are not proficient in 3rd grade will be retained so that they are provided more targeted, intensive instruction to meet their needs. All stakeholders are informed and involved in the process. Again, I’m meeting with their experts tomorrow to learn more, but I have provided you with their legislation on this mandate. I am also happy to provide you with their research on their retention policy.
Louisiana
Louisiana is another state that has made more gains than other states in early literacy. As I looked through their web site, I noticed their Let Teachers Teach initiative. I provided all of you with this initiative because I know that one of the MOST important things we can do for teachers is to guard their instructional time and this document shows how to do that. From dealing with excessive student behaviors, inadequate plan time, controversial curriculum materials, and more, teachers are burning out at faster rates than ever before. We must take action in guarding instructional time so that teachers can teach and students can learn.
Concluding Statement
In Conclusion, the most important things that we can do are:
Review Nebraska’s Education Preparation programs and the hours teachers are getting with quality literacy instruction
Guard instructional time so teachers and students aren’t distracted with excessive behaviors
Limit screen time and emphasize physical books and writing for elementary students
Get rid of controversial instructional materials that keep kids from reading fun, age-appropriate books
Implement a third grade retention policy
Additional points to consider:
Smaller class sizes in primary grades, especially during the ELA block
Well trained and well paid paras in the K/1 classrooms during the ELA block
Continue with plan to train administrators on effective literacy instruction
Interested in learning more about UFLI, WORDS, LETRS and remain cautious with relying on curriculum makers to train our teachers.
If you would like me to send you my google doc with this script, I have my research linked and am happy to share. Thank you for your time today.
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