The USA Literacy Problem

Where are non-readers found in our nation?

In contrast to popular belief, the failure of so many of our children to learn to read is not concentrated among particular types of schools or among specific groups of students. Rather, students who have difficulty reading represent a virtual cross-section of American children. They include rich and poor, male and female, rural and urban, and public and private school children in all sections of our country.

The latest NAEP assessment scores confirm to us that the failure of a great number of our children to learn to read during their first three years of school has become a grave, national problem—one that confronts every parent in every community in our country. A common stumbling block for all of these non-readers is this basic truth: They did not acquire the ability to recognize what reading experts call "phonemes."

How Extensive is Our U.S. LITERACY PROBLEM?

Consider these facts:

Fact 1:  From The Nation's Report Card, the average reading scores for high school seniors in this country declined for all but the top performers. In fact, the scores for U.S. high school seniors in 2005 were actually lower than they were in 1992.

http://nationsreportcard.gov/reading_math_grade12_2005/s0201.asp

Fact 2:   America is loaded with students who struggle terribly in reading.  More than 8 million students in grades 4 through 12 are struggling readers. What's even worse is the fact that 2 out of 3 high school students in America reads below grade level. But the heart-wrenching news is that 1 out of 4 high school students reads far below grade level.
     So many American students who leave eighth grade to enter high school cannot read well enough to learn what they need to prepare for college.  Sadly, 70% of United States eighth graders cannot read at grade level. That means that only 3 out of 10 eighth graders in this country enter their junior high and high school years with the reading skills they need to succeed in life!

Alliance for Excellent Education

Fact 3: Current statistics using today's public school rading methods tell us that if efficient reading skills are not developed by the time a child enters the fourth grade, the English language, history, mathematics, current events, and the rich morsels of literature and science for that child become inaccessible.

http://eric.hoagiesgifted.org/frstchap.html

Fact 4: All of those statistics can change for the child who learns to read using systematic, intensive phonics (that same phonics that taught little Candy to read.)  Statistics can change when parents, grandparents, teachers, and tutors intervene with a systematic, synthetic 4WAY Phonetic reading method.  The United States can learn from Scotland's latest reading study.  England, as well, is considering Scotland's famous Clackmannanshire study which clearly showed that schoolchildren taught to read using systematic, synthetic phonics were three and a half years more advanced in reading than their counterparts and and two years advanced in spelling.
http://www.civitas.org.uk/press/prcs63.php
http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2005/jun/03/schools.uk5

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