Readers Write (Oct. 25): Academic rigor in kindergarten, legislative pay amendment, health insurance, Bob Dylan's prize

Walking is a developmental skill. It is impossible to teach a 9-month-old child to walk if he is "programmed" to begin walking at 12 months. If a child's brain is not ready to learn a particular skill, the child simply cannot learn it.

Reading is a developmental skill ("Across state, kindergarten is becoming the new first grade," Oct. 24). When reading is part of the curriculum in kindergarten, a significant number of students will simply not catch on. Public schools in the U.S. have been emphasizing academic instruction at earlier and earlier ages, which results directly in many children feeling like failures for not being able to master what their brains are not ready to learn, and who are destined not to become fluent readers because the level of instruction is always too high for them to benefit.

Successfully teaching a greater proportion of students to read fluently by third grade requires more than instruction in reading decoding (phonics). Ideally, all students come from homes where they are read to, exposed to books extensively and have preschool experience. We all know this is not the case. Students from "low print" homes have not had this experience. Skills they need to learn in kindergarten include holding books right side up, scanning from left to right and top to bottom, recognizing word boundaries in print (the space that indicates that one word has ended and another has begun), and being able to separate words into their sounds (not letters).

If children can generate rhyming words, it is an indication that they know that they can take one sound off the beginning of a word and substitute another. This is the time to introduce formal reading instruction. It makes me very sad to see rooms with kindergartners who simply are not ready for the academic setting in which they find themselves, and are not taught the skills that would help them most. My comments are based on research and experience gained from more than 30 years working in Minneapolis public schools.

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I am happy to know that Minnesota really understands the importance of rigor in kindergarten. The unfortunate tendency of children to want to enjoy themselves must stop, despite claims of mushy-minded "experts" who say that play improves "social and emotional development," whatever that is. We must maintain our economic and military superiority. Children should not be allowed to behave like children.

The writer is an emeritus professor at the Rossier School of Education at the University of Southern California and president of the Kindergarten Kalculus Association.

"Kindergarten is the new first grade" claims that early education will close the achievement gap. Please note that the photograph on the jump page was of three little kids, half asleep, all resting their heads on their hands. Looks to me they are trying to close their eyes, not the achievement gap.

Congratulations to the Star Tribune Editorial Board. It has come out for an amendment that could radically change the way all levels of government do business in this country ("Vote yes on pay amendment," Oct. 24). Why stop at having an outside committee set legislative salaries? Since we are going to remove that responsibility, and accountability, from our elected officials, I suggest that the proposed salary council, or others like it, be appointed to handle all laws that the elected officials feel might impact their electability. For instance, the Minnesota Senate could let an outside committee decide to build a new office building. Then, no member would have had to worry about justifying it to constituents. Or light-rail funding, or raising or lowering taxes, or … .

The fact that the council will have been appointed by elected officials, who will be choosing an equal number of Democrats and Republicans, thereby eliminating the rights and wishes of nonaligned voters, raises serious questions. Even more questionable is that the amendment removes one of the responsibilities of office. Elected officials need to be held accountable for what they do. If they are afraid to adjust their salaries due to political considerations, how can they possibly sell any of their ideas to one another and to the voting public?

The dramatic 2017 premium increases and reduced options for private health insurance are the result of giving the insurance companies too much autonomy in determining what they will offer, to whom, and at what cost.

Being self-employed, I've had to purchase private insurance for 15-plus years (with and without MNsure), and have dutifully paid premiums and out-of-pocket expenses that astronomically exceeded any covered benefits. With all those profits I've afforded my insurer for years, it's maddening that they've now canceled my plan and have effectively "dumped" me.

It's insulting and wrong to make citizens so powerless over our own health and financial well-being — putting us on this annual treadmill of turmoil and uncertainty, and now culminating in a one-week rush on an enrollment website that will probably crash under the pressure. Yes, have a special legislative session for emergency 2017 cost relief, but we urgently need systemic change, too. If MNsure must continue to rely on the insurance industry, I agree with Mike Hatch ("Here are 6 things the state can do right now," Oct.20): audit and regulate/control the insurance companies' role better, and add a single payer/government option for those without access to employer or public-program coverage.

I read Monday morning in the Star Tribune that a member of the Swedish Academy that awarded the Nobel Prize in literature to Bob Dylan felt that Bob was impolite and arrogant for not commenting on the award. The man I know is not that person. Some 40 years ago, Bob was at our home buying a business-related item for his home — quiet, humble and pleasant, along with his brother Dave. Many years later at our business, he was a guest and furnishing items for his home in Minnesota. I drove my vintage Rolls-Royce to his nephew's wedding, and Bob chatted with me about his collector car, a Mustang, and we had a lively conversation. At the reception, a local Buffalo dentist told Bob that he never liked his music, which I'm sure was hurtful. Bob doesn't feel the need to pat himself on the back for all of the things he has achieved in his lifetime. Impolite and arrogant? Not ever.

The writer owns an antiques and architectural business.