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- Subscribe - Contact Us - Rate Card - Place an Ad Archives Revels Classifieds Real Estate Menu Guide Wedding Weather Subscribe Contact Us September 6, 2005 Case In Point : Education Reading skills for all is issue of national concern By Chris Honoré Tidings Correspondent The fourth grade. Think of it as base camp, a point of demarcation from which children should not leave unless sufficiently outfitted with all the skills so necessary for survival in an information age. Educators know this and it is accepted pedagogical doctrine. The first four years are critical for so many reasons and perhaps the most important is the acquisition of reading skills. If youngsters are not equipped by the end of fourth grade with at least basic reading skills, remediation can prove to be, if not difficult, all but impossible. It is a line clearly drawn in the sand. Yet, as has been reported, by Dr. Grover Whitehurst of the U.S. Department of Education’s Institute of Education Sciences, 38 to 40 percent of all children are not reading at the basic level at the fourth grade. “That means,” says Whitehurst, “that they are unable to deal with age-appropriate written text and understand the text or make reasonable inferences from what they’re reading in the text. And we know that children who have that sort of difficulty reading in the fourth grade, without extraordinary help, are going to have real difficulties down the road ... it flows into other subject matters, the ability to finish school, the likelihood that they will drop out, they’re potential for life success, getting a good job.” Whitehurst identifies this as a national crisis. Or, put more harshly, a failure by our educators of stunning proportions. Basic level reading, Whitehurst goes on to explain, is not to be confused with proficiency. Someone who is reading at a basic level can understand words, can answer simple questions about the factual information presented in written text, and can read with enough fluency to get through the material on time and answer the questions. Students who are performing at a proficient level can go beyond that to make reasonable inferences from the material they read without conscious processing (much like you are doing as you read this paragraph). But consider: we are not talking about either basic or proficient level reading. The 38 to 40 percent figure means that almost half of all children assessed are unable to break the code, meaning they can’t look at words and derive any meaning from them that makes sense — something that is expected by at least the second grade. This is an astonishing statistic. And the numbers for minority students are even grimmer. The argument can easily be made that at the center of all academics is the word. Reading. It is essential to achieving even a modicum of success as each student navigates the school curricula. Everything that is presented to young learners is, in some fashion, dependent on literacy, meaning proficient reading. Whitehurst points out that it is from reading we acquire information about worlds we will never actually know; we can learn empathy as we care about characters in fiction; and we can begin to comprehend the complexities of the world, of human behavior, in all its myriad forms, of science and physics and history. Individuals who are excluded from this most essential survival skill will go through life severely handicapped, if not fated to lead lives on the periphery of society. It’s a form of de facto segregation (not of race but of persons) and a correlative to crime, unemployment and poverty, truncating young lives even before they have begun. They will be excluded from economic opportunities, and inevitably consigned to the lowest strata of society. It is a downward spiral that becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy, and the implications are tragic. Once students encounter difficulty in reading, many never recover. They feel attendant shame, they hide in other activities that they can master (such as sports). And, as Whitehurst states, all too often, failure to master this very difficult skill is felt by the student to be his or her failure, which, he maintains, is patently false. To learn to decode English is no small thing. Consider the fallout when students reach the higher grades. Only half off all high school graduates read well enough to succeed in college. Millions of young people are dropping out of high school when it is clear that a four-year college education is becoming all but prerequisite for attaining a middle-class lifestyle. According the to Center for American Progress and the Institute for America’s Future, “Young low-income minority children by the fourth grade read about three levels behind nonpoor students. Across the nation, only 15 percent of low-income fourth graders achieved proficiency in reading in 2003.” The ACT, which produces one of the nation’s leading college admissions tests, reports that only about half of this year’s high school graduates have the reading skills they need to succeed in college. The report, based on scores of the 2005 high school graduates who took the exam, indicates that “Fewer than one in four met the college-readiness benchmarks in all four subjects: reading comprehension, English, math and science.” The fourth grade. And all the grades prior. This is the time when we must make every effort, use whatever resources are required, change the entire structure of early elementary education if need be, to ensure that when it comes to reading no child is left behind. Not one youngster should be passed along to the fifth grade without, at the very least, the ability to read at a basic level. To allow this to happen shows a lack of courage and will. It is a national disgrace. Case in Point is a weekly editorial column designed to provide in-depth commentary on current events. Responses should be less than 250 words and sent to [email protected] . DailyTidings.com Home Page Archives | Revels | Classifieds | Real Estate Guide | Weather | Subscribe | Contact Us Copyright 2005 Ashland Daily Tidings and Ottaway Newspapers All Rights Reserved Deep Muscle Stimulator Ceramic Piggy Banks FREE Entertainment Guide Women's & Men's Slippers Accelerate Weightloss Products Backpacks Generic Viagra Vegas Travel Guide Search Engine Optimization Sportsbook Absinthe Supply Student Loans Hotel & Airline Reservations African Safari Hammocks Helzberg Diamonds Online Casinos Community Bonus Casino King of Spirits ink cartridges Mortgage Calculator Security Systems Mailing Lists Click Here Advertisement .:Advertisements:. Site Search: RESOURCES - Mail Tribune News - ODOT Road Cams