Well, I don't think DEEN needs to say flat out that weirdness of Maria reading the letter.
The primary audience is native Japanese speakers.
There are various words in that letter that aren't in a normal 9 year's old vocabulary.
A perceptive listener probably would have picked up that Maria probably should have had a harder time to read the letter.
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To elaborate this point, one would require Japanese knowledge: although it is rather difficult to check with the anime alone, we can testify with the game that the letter was absolutely not in plain Hiragana, but filled with kanji. And to make things interesting, several of them are certainly not suited for a 4th grader (such like 師 for fifth grade, 錬 and 契 for seventh grade).
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By itself those kanji may be hard to read, but when I was around Maria's age I knew how to read 錬金術師 and 契約 which are probably the two words you pulled those kanjis from. If Maria has been reading books about witches or any books/mangas in the fantasy genre, she most likely has been exposed to those words.
I personally don't think the kanji/grade is a great way to measure what Maria can and cannot read. To me it was 致して or 当家顧問 and the over all language of the letter that will clue that off to a listener especially since she read it without stuttering.
To me hearing it vocally made that letter stand out more than reading it.
I wouldn't mark this particular fact a failure on DEEN's part.
Ho-chan was effective.
It is something worth pointing out, but I wouldn't go so far as say failure.