When the Script Fails
Written on August 3, 2025
Walk into many classrooms across California, and you’ll find teachers flipping through binders or projecting scripted lessons, adhering to decades-old curriculum guides as if they were the gospel. These resources, many of which were last adopted in 2015, continue to shape reading instruction across the state. Despite being outdated, lacking in cultural responsiveness, and notably insufficient in foundational literacy components like systematic phonics instruction, many districts and schools have not veered from the state-adopted path. For a state as diverse and populous as California, this is not just a pedagogical shortcoming, it’s a crisis.
California is currently experiencing a well-documented literacy crisis. NAEP scores continue to reflect troubling proficiency gaps, particularly among Black, Latino, multilingual learners, and students with disabilities. 3 out of 10 adults struggle with basic reading (EdSource, 2024). These outcomes are not inevitable. They are the result of persistent mismatches between the needs of students and the tools teachers are provided. Among these mismatches is the overreliance on outdated, scripted ELA curricula.
As a reading specialist, I have seen firsthand the consequences of this overreliance: educators who lose confidence in their own professional judgment, children who do not see themselves reflected in the texts they read, and students who fall further behind because the curriculum fails to teach them how to decode words in the first place. When educators are tethered to pre-written lessons that ignore student data and local context, instruction becomes static and is delivered *to* students rather than *with* them.
Many of these older programs were adopted before the surge of current research on the science of reading. They are not aligned with what we now know about the importance of explicit, systematic phonics instruction as part of a comprehensive literacy framework. Instead, they often rely heavily on leveled readers and rote comprehension questions that do little to support the decoding, language development, or background knowledge students truly need.
In addition, these programs frequently fail to consider the lived experiences of California’s students. A curriculum that is not culturally responsive or relevant alienates children. It signals to students—intentionally or not—that their identities, histories, and voices do not belong in their school or classroom. In a multilingual and multicultural state like ours, that’s more than an oversight; it’s truly an equity issue.
It is encouraging that California is currently in the process of reviewing and updating its ELA/ELD adoption guidelines. But while we wait for new materials to be approved and implemented, our students cannot wait. Educators must be the ones to make instructional decisions rooted in current research and student needs. That begins with professional learning that centers the science of reading, data-informed differentiation, and instructional equity.
What does this look like in practice? It looks like using universal screeners and progress monitoring tools to inform small-group phonics instruction. It looks like offering vocabulary development anchored in rich, knowledge-building texts. It looks like choosing read-alouds and mentor texts that reflect the diversity of students’ cultures, languages, and communities. And it absolutely looks like giving teachers permission to move beyond the script when it no longer serves their students.
Our role as educators is not to perform a curriculum. It is to teach children. When we prioritize research-based methods, honor student identity, and remain responsive to data, we move toward that goal. Our kids’ futures depend on it.
