I think about this kind of thing a lot!

I teach violin, and as helpful as it can be to break things down, sometimes kids get lost in the details and it's helpful to move to larger pieces (either more complex challenges, or longer phrases) and allow things to be messy for a while. My usual guideline is that engagement comes before anything else. Once the child is exciting about playing, lots of approaches will work.

With reading, I would think the first thing is to have a good association with it, and the next is to inspire the desire to read. Only then does it make sense to look at details of pedagogy.