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<p>Limabeans, you come across as a very caring teacher. I think you’ve come up with your own answer as to how to help your students - you need to teach them to read and if that means incorporating phonics in your lessons, that’s what you need to do. My former state had a big program on reading by third grade - it was found that students who couldn’t read by third grade just fell further and further behind, since most of the learning in upper grades presupposes the ability to read. That puts a lot of responsiblity on you, as their last best hope!</p>
<p>I would give as much instructional time as possible to reading and also to math, incorporating them into whatever other subjects I was also required to teach.</p>