Literacy- It's a Choice!

We are rebounding after a season of flu. All I can say is that it sure lasted awhile-- much longer than the standard version! At least it didn't have anything to do with birds...

A couple of articles caught my eye in the past couple of weeks. The most interesting, "Literacy of College Graduates Is on Decline," out of the Washington Post didn't come as a great shock. Although the experts claim to be baffled by graduates' decline in reading proficiency, doesn't it seem obvious that people who don't read often will not be able to read well? The aphorism, "practice makes perfect," remains perfectly true. If, as the study suggests, "only 31 percent of college graduates can read a complex book and extrapolate from it," there has obviously been a breakdown somewhere in the educational process.

The "experts" can be as puzzled as they like-- anyone who has been through the public schools can probably attest to the vast amounts of time wasted on non-educational activities. The trend toward dumbing down education didn't start in the past few years-- it's been going on for decades. I remember most classes in school as an absolute waste of time. Assignments were minimal (though most people took them home for homework), and reading was often "culturally relevant" nonsense (we read Hinton's gang lit, as the powers-that-be considered it appropriate for an East L.A. high school population-- what a waste of time!).

Between dumbed-down primary and secondary education, and the vast onslaught of electronic distractions from reading, it's no wonder that literacy is down. The wonder is that anyone is surprised!

There's an elegantly simple solution to the problem of dumbed-down education, though, and it's called homeschool. It allows families to custom-tailor educational experiences to a student's needs, accelerating or focusing in greater depth as needed. Numerous studies have shown homeschoolers outperforming their traditionally schooled counterparts by significant margins, and it has to do with efficiency and focus. Home educators are able to focus on an area until it's mastered; they are able to pursue areas of interest in depth; they can learn at their own pace; they can recruit outside tutors as needed; they are not held back by discipline issue and non-academic nonsense; and they can take the time to make almost any area of study rich and fascinating. It's not hard for a lean, focused home-education experience to beat a system that is bloated with problems and laden with unnecessary frills and furbelows!

As for the electronic distractions-- it's a choice, isn't it? You can choose to provide books and basketballs for your children, or you can provide televisions, x-boxes, iPods, and whatever the latest electro-gadget is. I realize that your choices will probably reflect your personal preferences and convictions, just as my choices for my children reflected my beliefs and desires for their future.

The bottom line is, if you want to have literate children, you must model behavior that leads to literacy. If you didn't have a good education, you can study right along with your children, and create a home atmosphere that promotes literacy. It is a choice, after all!