Here are three things on my mind as NZ’s literacy problems are once again thrust into the spotlight.
Generally, all it takes is the right book.
My daughter has always been forthright about what she thinks. When it came to books that were sent home for reading, invariably when the time came she would say ‘I don’t want to read that stupid stuff’.
Fair enough.
If there’s one sure way to turn kids off reading it’s in pressuring them to read ‘stupid stuff’.
If there’s one sure way to turn kids into readers it’s letting them read anything they’re into.
Just ask a librarian.
A conversation on the cricket boundary this weekend went like this
He never used to like reading. I could never get him to read much at home.
Now I can’t stop him, and that’s thanks to Mr. G. He’s got him into WWII stories.
Sure, this kid can already read and we should in no way discount the importance of teaching those foundational reading skills, but it took a teacher to spark his imagination before he wanted to read.
That, and time, coupled with access to the right books.
The same kind of thinking that got us into this mess won’t get us out of it.
Lots of the headlines in the media have highlighted the assessment aspect of the proposed response.
This is a shame, and I can’t help but think it also carries with it an unspoken assumption: things have been too soft for too long, too ‘woolly’, too PC, that what schools need to do is go back to basics and forget all this student-centred bullshit.
Problem is, what’s dominated education and schools in NZ for the last 12 years is a relentless focus on assessment and the pressure to achieve.
Schools spend hours each day exclusively on literacy and maths, with all the other six learning areas being squeezed in, if there’s time.
The decline in literacy, maths and science accelerated in 2009, the same time as we introduced National Standards, which led to the massive narrowing of our kids’ educational experience.
And so, in reading the Ministry of Education’s Literacy & Communication and Maths Strategy document, it was nice to see an acknowledgement of the importance of a widening of approaches to the development of literacy, centred on the student.
It’s important this doesn’t get lost in the natter about grades.
If we want to change literacy outcomes, a different way of thinking about how this is done is required. What’s done in the classrooms needs to change.
This will only happen with leadership.
What’s reached for first, when seeking to know more about the world, matters.
Instead of reaching for YouTube when a kid has a question, how about going to the school’s library? When YouTube is first, the kid, surely, comes to see YouTube as the first and most important port of call for knowing stuff.
I get it: YouTube is quick, easy, accessible.
Quick, easy, accessible: are these words associated with critical thinking?
Sure, books can be hard to access. So many schools have relegated their library to a hall cupboard as a result of roll pressures and funding efficiencies.
Books light up imaginations in a way that YouTube can’t, though. They give people time to think in a way that YouTube doesn’t.
Nothing beats a well funded and resourced school library, open and staffed all the time, in the heart of the school. If there are any school boards out there worried about their students’ literacy results, I suggest they play their part in addressing it by starting there.
Go Bevan! Great you have responded to this so quickly. Hope it gets read along side the ‘literacy deficit’ report. If teachers are forced to spend little time on the other developmental competency areas you would hope the penny would drop re the impact this is likely to have on literacy/mathematical areas.
Thank you for another brilliant article. Hope you are soon back to full health.