170.300.  Phonics instruction pilot project. — Notwithstanding any provision of law to the contrary, beginning with the 1999-2000 school year, there is hereby established within each subdistrict of each metropolitan school district, a pilot project of explicit phonics instruction for students up to and including third grade.  This project shall employ the methodology of teaching public school students to pronounce and read words by learning the phonetic sound associations of individual letters, letter groups and syllables and the principles governing these associations.  Reading instruction using implied recognition of words or partial words through the use of pictures or other references other than explicit pronunciation of phonetic letter combinations shall not be admitted as a substitute or in combination with explicit phonics instruction.