Literacy in America falling?

[Katahu]

text messaging? well, with the way some girls i know do it, that probly does lower it.  :-/

I can see the effects of text messaging right now.

[Dr.bob7]

hehe got me there  :D

[JBaymore]

I've been teaching at the (US) college level since the mid seventies.

[MattNW]

I transferred out of my first secondary school for similar. They handed us a sheet with the questions and the answers; on the test day they swapped us for a sheet with only the (very same) questions. All we'd had to do was memorize the printed words -- no need to even know the language. Just give me the books and I can go memorize it on my own without paying tuition for it.

Ah, but then you wouldn't have that piece of paper saying you learned it and a lot of schools would go bankrupt.  ;)

That's another thing I noticed when taking some college classes a few years back. At the high school level too much emphasis is put on rote memorization and not enough on thinking for yourself. In the college classes there were a number of kids just out of high school who lacked a lot of critical thinking skills that are needed for college and the real world. They could memorize things like nobodies business but give them a half dozen articles in a journal and ask them to synthesize an opinion or draw a conclusion and they were totally lost. I imagine I was in the same situation when I graduated. The high school I went to placed very little emphasis on thinking for yourself. In fact they actually discouraged it. It took many years in the real world after high school to develop these skills and I've noticed that a lot of people never have. That should be priority #1 in all levels of education.

There was also very little emphasis on outside learning when I was in high school. If it wasn't in the offical text then it wasn't to be brought up in class. I've noticed that hasn't improved much since then. When I took an elective Astronomy class, the professor would occasionally bring in material that had been published after the text book had been written. Almost invariably there would be one student who would ask if this was going to be on the test. The professor would always answer, "It wasn't but now that you asked that question it is".  ;D

[Katahu]

There was also very little emphasis on outside learning when I was in high school. If it wasn't in the offical text then it wasn't to be brought up in class. I've noticed that hasn't improved much since then. When I took an elective Astronomy class, the professor would occasionally bring in material that had been published after the text book had been written. Almost invariably there would be one student who would ask if this was going to be on the test. The professor would always answer, "It wasn't but now that you asked that question it is".

So, if a astronomy book were to mention that the moon is made out of cheese, the teacher would be discouraged to state otherwise?

I remember watching a movie called "Freedom Writers" a while ago. It's about a woman who decided to become a teacher at a run-down high school filled with delinquents. She was faced with political red tape, 100% illiterate students, and the harsh fact that only 1 out of the 20 students in her class knew about the Holocaust. You should all see it as it is quite an emotional film that shows us all the harsh reality we now face with kids these days.

[H]

I transferred out of my first secondary school for similar. They handed us a sheet with the questions and the answers; on the test day they swapped us for a sheet with only the (very same) questions. All we'd had to do was memorize the printed words -- no need to even know the language. Just give me the books and I can go memorize it on my own without paying tuition for it.

Ah, but then you wouldn't have that piece of paper saying you learned it and a lot of schools would go bankrupt.

If that's their method, they should -- their piece of paper rather cheats the future employer and, thereby, the recipients of their product or services. It seems I was fortunate enough to have high school teachers that did prefer that one think, expecting more out of you for the next term. Since I'd been taught to learn, that's what I expected to do.

8-)

[Brett_Henderson]

The irony in this thread is palpable...

[TacitBlue]

I have a great example of what MattNW mentioned about things not in the official text. When I was in high school I took Spanish, and I remember this vividly because it made me so angry. In one assignment we simply had to write a number of complete sentences that were put together properly and made sense in Spanish. I got a bad grade because I used a word that we had not covered in class. I did however use the Spanish to English dictionary that we had been given for that class. But sense we hadn't officially had "mono" as a vocabulary word, then "It's monkey time!" was considered wrong!

P.S. my Spanish teacher was the personification of the B word. No one, not even the other teachers liked her.

[H]

But sense we hadn't officially had "mono" as a vocabulary word, then "It's monkey time!" was considered wrong!

It may not make sense but since you put it that way...

8-)

[Katahu]

I have a great example of what MattNW mentioned about things not in the official text. When I was in high school I took Spanish, and I remember this vividly because it made me so angry. In one assignment we simply had to write a number of complete sentences that were put together properly and made sense in Spanish. I got a bad grade because I used a word that we had not covered in class. I did however use the Spanish to English dictionary that we had been given for that class. But sense we hadn't officially had "mono" as a vocabulary word, then "It's monkey time!" was considered wrong!

P.S. my Spanish teacher was the personification of the B word. No one, not even the other teachers liked her.

Now this is something to ponder about. Why should any student, especially in high school, be punished for going above and beyond one's expectations like that? That's like saying that there is a penalty for success. :-?

[Hagar]

I think we're drifting off the subject. Literacy & numeracy start in the home before children go to school. This does not involve much in the way of thinking for oneself & the best way of doing it is by encouraging young children to read, the sooner the better. Anyone can do this including parents & older siblings. It doesn't matter what they read providing they like doing it. If children have difficulty reading or writing by the time they leave primary education at the age of 10 or 11 I can almost guarantee they will have severe problems with further education & eventual employment.

From what I've read in this topic it seems that Britain has followed the US education model since the 1970s with the same disastrous results. If that is the case I have to wonder why.

[ozzy72]

If that is the case I have to wonder why

That is an easy one to answer Doug, each British Ministry is a tombstone. The Dept. Of Trade and Industry marks the grave of British enterprise, the Dept. Of Health marks the grave of lots of patients, and the Dept. Of Education marks the grave of British intelligence. Hence why we now have things like the Teletubbies and the Spice Girls and people worship David Beckham even when he doesn't have 2 brain cells to rub together

[Chris_F]

The definition of what "literate" is must be getting tighter.  How could text messaging and the internet be to blame?  If you can do either then you must be literate, right?  Or does "literate" now mean "able to spell correctly and use proper grammar"?  If so then I'm illiterate.  I can't spell for beans.

[H]

I can't spell for beans.

Then you must mean 'four' beans...

8-)

[ozzy72]

The odd spelling mistake or typo doesn't make you illiterate (heck I'm an English teacher and even I get it wrong from time-to-time).
My mum is dyslexic and only found out whilst on a nursing course when they did some random testing as an example of how these tests were done on kids (mum was a paediatric nurse). After 4 decades nursing we finally discovered why she was useless at spelling anything other than long medical words (she learned those by rote) and that there was a reason she was a naff navigator
As long as you can communicate in a comprehensible fashion that is fine. The trouble with txt spk on an international forum is that not everyone has English as a first language and can work out what the gibberish means!
You could argue that all Britons consider all Americans illiterate for spelling colour with only 5 letters or axe without an 'e' But that is just a cultural difference...
Mind you I was recently marking language exam papers and this particular set had the highest failure rate I've seen in 9 years of teaching here as there was so much txt spk and American spelling within them (the exam is based upon the Queens English).... oddly enough not one of my students failed 8-)