[hotnfresh]

The older I get the more convinced I am that a core skill schools should teach—started from early grade school—is speaking. Reading is probably the single most important skill, period, but—and I write this as someone with a bias toward writing—I think speaking is more important than writing, for most people. Not that learning to write doesn't teach skills relevant to speaking! Not that we should stop teaching writing! But I think getting over that kind of anxiety is exactly the kind of thing that every school ought to teach, and I think if the only way to accomplish that were to sacrifice some writing instruction, it'd be worth it.