[Reading-hall-of-fame] Re: Stopping Adult Illiteracy at the Source

[Nicholson, Tom]

Dear Tom
That is a very clever Q and A from you – it makes a lot of sense. I’m helping one of the University groundsmen to read and I can see his life fits into every one of the Q and As. Fortunately he is such a positive person who has no resentment or issues about not learning to read and he wants to learn even though it is very late. We are way at the beginning though, he is reading at a Grade 1 level and I often wonder how could that happen but it obviously does. Keep fighting the good fight … Tom


12/28/2018
Stopping Adult Illiteracy at the Source

Tom Sticht
International Consultant in Adult Education (Ret.)

Question: Why do we have all these adults who are practically illiterate?
Why can’t they read?

Answer: Because the high schools are graduating functional illiterates. So we need to fix the high schools so they stop sending functional
illiterates out into the world.

Q: Why don’t the high schools teach students to read before they graduate them?

A: It’s too late. The middle schools keep sending the high schools students who can’t read so the high schools can’t teach the academic subjects they need to teach while also teaching students to read. We need to have the middle schools stop sending students to high school who can’t read.

Q: Why don’t the middle schools teach students to read before they send them on to high school?

A: It’s too late. The primary grades keep sending the middle schools
students who can’t read so the middle schools can’t teach the subjects
they are supposed to teach to prepare the students for high school and
also teach the kids to read. We need to have the primary schools stop
sending students to middle school who can’t read.

Q: Why don’t the primary schools teach students to read before they send them on to middle school?

A: It’s too late. Parents keep sending the primary schools children who
have not been prepared to learn to read at home. We need a pre-school like Head Start to prepare children to learn to read so parents can stop
sending children to primary school who aren’t ready to learn to read.

Q: Why do so many children have to go to Head Start to get prepared to
learn to read? Why don’t parents prepare them at home?

A: It’s too late by age 3 or 4. That’s why we need Early Head Start so
children can be prepared starting at birth to go to Head Start so they can
learn to read in primary school so they can learn pre-high school subjects in middle school so they can learn high school subjects and graduate from high school able to read and be fully literate to contribute to society.

Q: Why are so many children born unprepared to be prepared to learn to read?

A: It’s too late by birth. Too many young adults are functionally
illiterate and unable to take care of themselves. Often they get involved
with drugs or other activities that destroy their bodies and harm their
minds. They often have many out of wedlock births, they are frequently
unable to make informed choices about good prenatal and postnatal care, and they are unable to afford it because they can’t qualify for well-paying jobs.

What we need is a high quality, well funded Adult Education and Literacy System in the United States that will prepare adults for parenting and profitable work which will permit them to  provide for their own and their children’s health, and send their children to school prepared to learn to read, support them through primary, middle and high schools, and graduate them with the literacy skills they need to participate fully in society.

It’s not too late. Adult literacy education contributes to the solution
of both present and future problems of adult literacy.
Reference
Sticht, T. (2011). Getting It Right From the Start: The Case for Early Parenthood Education. American Educator. The American Federation of Teachers. [Available online using a Google search]



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