Schwa

  In school, Max has been learning sight words.  When he was younger, it was just survival words (danger, restroom), by sight.  His tutor is teaching him how to sound out words, introducing rules about when to double final letters & when not.
  And the schwa sound.
  She says it's not being taught any more.  Really?  It is a funny symbol, but very useful in sounding out words, reading dictionary entries. We were introduced to it in 2nd grade, but then it wasn't mentioned again until Intro to Linguistics in college.
  How about you?  Were you introduced to schwa in school or otherwise?  Have you found it useful?