Amanda Ross, producer of the Richard & Judy Channel 4 show, delivered a petition to number 10 this week, urging greater efforts to get children reading. The Times tells us that she led a delegation of leading authors to number 10. According to my count, some 546 authors signed the petition. Here is the letter, copied from The Times:
Dear Mr Brown,
As authors, we are deeply concerned at the low levels of childhood literacy across Britain. Official figures suggest that around one in five children leave their primary schools at the age of 11 unable to read to the minimum standard required of their age group.
In a complex world, reading has become increasingly important — if not crucial. As the Department for Culture, Media and Sport has pointed out: “People cannot be active or informed citizens unless they can read. Reading is a prerequisite for almost all cultural and social activities”. The International Reading Association puts it more bluntly: “Adolescents entering the adult world in the 21st century will read and write more than at any other time in human history. They will need advanced levels of literacy to perform their jobs, run their households, act as citizens, and conduct their personal lives.”
We, the undersigned, are therefore pleased to lend our support to Channel 4's “Lost for Words” campaign, which aims to get all our kids reading. The fact of the matter is that all children in mainstream schools are capable of learning to read — and so all children should be taught to read in school, for an hour every day, until they are able to read properly.
In fact, everyone who cares about the future of our children's education needs to ask: What more can we do? A year ago, for example, half the children at Monteagle Primary School in the London Borough of Barking and Dagenham were more than a year behind where they should have been in their reading levels. Twelve months on, after a concerted effort by staff, parents and pupils, the school has managed to cut this level of functional illiteracy by half and doubled the number of children who are reading to their age-appropriate levels or above.
The reality is that the issue of childhood literacy transcends party politics and ideological divisions — and unites all of us who care about the future of our children. You have said that “every child is special, every child precious and therefore no child should be left behind”. It's time to focus on the push to get all our kids reading to make this happen.
Yours faithfully,
...
You can find out more about Channel 4's "Lost for Words" season of campaigning programmes to get all our kids reading here.
I can't help but feel this is left dangling a bit, but perhaps we will see more reporting in due course.
What is the reaction of the UK government? What actions will ensue? With online petitions on the number 10 site reaching millions in signatures and the government taking a standard feline approach - "I've heard you but I'll get back to you when I feel like it and just because you think it's a good idea, it doesn't mean to say I think it's good for you and I know best" - can we expect the government to sit up and take note of the urging of some of our great and good? Spin can only win the day for the short term and take note please those who have been elected in to serve our country: spin's life cycle gets shorter by the day. Recently, Ed Balls had little to offer to convince the electorate that "education, education, education" was indeed a real priority. And you have to ask: given that word came out in triplicate (for emphasis) more than ten years ago when Labour was courting the electorate, what have you lot been doing since then? Recent surveys show a dire situation in the UK in respect of reading ability amongst the young.
Reading is a basic. Without the ability to read, nothing follows. If a person experiences difficulty in reading, all that follows will also prove to be difficult. If we have a generation heading for a start in life that means claiming benefits, even completing the forms will prove to be difficult. What hope do they have of more than this?
Those of us who read and enjoy reading are in the enviable position of taking it for granted. We read for leisure and entertainment, appreciating the storytelling of masters in that craft. We read to be informed in a timely fashion, appreciating the terse and lean prose of the journalist. Those who have difficulty in reading miss out on all this.
At work, we all have to read material and write, even if only occasionally, to somebody. This also affects the economy. Got a team of youngsters who can only write in text speak? You can guarantee that the "aged" team leader/manager will be working double time, checking on the writing of an email or letter before it departs outside the door, editing it and possibly rewriting it.
Reading and writing allow us to express ourselves; the greater the vocabulary we learn, the better able we are to express ourselves.
Reading is a basic we cannot afford to see put on the backburner in life. Allowing our young to struggle in this domain is doing just that and this needs to be corrected with urgency. Fortunately, Monteagle Primary School in the London Borough of Barking and Dagenham has proven that correction is possible and can be timely.
I hate to say this, but if you're over 40 you will know what is possible when it comes to education and you, like me, will probably despair at what is happening now. There's an old adage "If it ain't broke, don't fix it". Where did it go so wrong and why?
Now is the time to start to fix our misconceptions and misdemeanours in providing education. Reading is not a "nice to have", it's an essential and the starting point in creating well educated and able people for all walks of life.
Should Mr Brown not grasp the urgency of this from the letter that was delivered this week, I suggest that Amanda Ross sets up an online petition on the 10 Downing Street site. I'm sure that many more, thousands, millions perhaps would sign up to see an end to this issue. No parent wants to see their child struggling with the basics. Every parent who is capable will complement this failing in our education system by putting their all into teaching their children as they had been taught. This makes the UK's survey results even more sad because those who can't, don't. Those who are failing are those who deserve to find a brilliant teaching provision in the public sector, when it comes to equality and opportunity for all.
Let's hope to see change here and I will be watching. I'll let you know if something fundamental and/or exciting happens to change the current situation in the UK. I've always been a supporter of Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs, but at this juncture I have to admit that I think he overlooked something important in the basics: "reading". It's an essential to life, right down there on the bottom layer in "physiological needs", as important as eating in our lives today. You can only effectively transcend the layers if you have that ability too.
Back to basics again. I urge anyone who is out of touch with this issue to take a revisit on the definition of "read". Merriam Webster will tell you. It's really not an option. It's a necessity for life in our contemporary world and a skill we cannot afford to see as "soft".
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