A series of programmes titled Can’t Read, Can’t Write on UK’s Channel 4 became compulsive viewing earlier in the year. Intent upon highlighting the adult illiteracy rate in the UK, it took a group of men and women who, because they had problems with reading and writing, had endured a lifetime of under achievement in education.
First there was the grandmother, denounced as a failure by her mother throughout her childhood, who suffered a panic attack when sent to the supermarket with a shopping list by her daughter, and ran home, sobbing, with an empty basket. Then we saw a young mother, filled with shame because she was unable to help with her children’s homework; and the middle-aged woman who relied on audio tapes to slake her thirst for culture. Finally, there was the labourer who longed to improve his job prospects. He had spent most of his working life erecting signs for the local council. Word-blind, he had to rely on the pattern and shape of the words – or even the accompanying pictures – to inform him as to which was the top of the sign and which the bottom.
TEACHING LITERACY THROUGH DRAMA
What each had in common was an inability to read or write. Passionate about the causes of illiteracy and ground-breaking means of teaching literacy effectively, award-winning teacher Phil Beadle spent six months trying to rectify the failings of a decade of schooling for his group of pupils. Discarding the adult literacy scheme as unusable because it required an existing ability to read, Phil used whatever innovative means he could devise, teaching literacy through drama, role play or music. For some of the group, physically laying out tangible bits and pieces of classroom equipment to make letters was the key. For others, it was the act of curving their hands and fingers into the shapes of letters.
The isolation resulting from being unable to read or write was painfully evident in the in the faces of Phil’s pupils. I cried, unashamedly, as we watched, week by week. So did my husband, once a teacher, and therefore part of the system which, it was implied, had failed these people.
DEVELOPING READING AND WRITING SKILLS
Conversely, the joy of word recognition, sentence structure, and comprehension was equally moving to watch. Seeing a grandmother’s delight as she read The Very Hungry Caterpillar haltingly to her grandson for the very first time, was enough to bring tears to anyone’s eyes. It certainly did to mine.
That level of success was not the experience of everyone in the group, however. One member of the class, a dyslexic, made only a tiny leap of progress. For the woman who had learned chunks of Shakespeare’s sonnets by heart from the audio tapes she’d acquired over the years, the ability to read brought great heartache and anger. She grieved for the education she’d lost and, unable to cope, walked out of the class. But gripped by the same determination that had brought her through her learning-to-read journey, she eventually enrolled in further education to take the GCSE’s and A levels previously denied her.
THE CONSEQUENCES OF UNDER-ACHIEVEMENT
Without doubt, lives were changed, and changed for the better. But sadly, the experience of these adults continues. Despite millions of pounds spent on promoting books to UK teenagers, one in four fails to reach the standards required in reading. This, in turn, means that they fail to acquire passes in other subjects which require them to read.
So what does this mean for the under-achievers? And for the rest of us? And who, if anyone, is to blame?
It’s clear from the evidence seen in the Channel 4 programme that in the future there will again be generations of disappointed mothers, low-grade labourers, frustrated intellectuals, and humiliated grandmothers. And another sub-culture of illiterates will be unable to hold down any sort of job, or to be upwardly mobile if they do secure work. For the vast majority, it will mean exclusion from a whole world of learning, of information, of make-believe. And for all of them it will leave them in a darkened world of secrecy and shame.
For those of us who are either fortunate enough, or sufficiently prudent, not to fall into these categories, it will mean a lifetime of paying taxes to provide benefits for those for whom our taxes failed to provide an education. For authors and publishers, it will mean shrinking markets and falling revenues. And for society, generally, it will mean an impoverishment of spirit. Because if there is one thing that reading does for society, it is to broaden the mind.
WHO’S TO BLAME & WHAT’S THE REMEDY?
Inevitably, the finger of blame is pointed at educationalists and politicians. But parents are not exempt. A quick look at history reveals that at the turn of the last century, illiteracy spelt poverty. Philanthropists were falling over themselves to educate the masses, and the masses, it has to be said, were intent upon bettering themselves. That is no longer the case. A Welfare State with its unmerited benefits is not conducive to pulling oneself up by one’s boot laces. Looking back to the days before television also reveals an era of parents reading bedtime stories to their children, and a time when communication, letters, holiday postcards and thank-you letters were the norm.
So where does this leave us and what, if any, are the solutions? I’m sorry to say that I don’t have any answers. Except to say that praps well all b reding th v hngry ctpiller in txt in yrs to cme.