READY FOR A SHOCK?

Here are some shocking statistics:

*Total percentage of U. S. adults who are unable to read an 8th grade level book:  50%

*Total percentage of U. S. high school graduates who will never read a book after high school:  33%

*Total percentage of college students who will never read another book after they graduate:  42%

*Total percentage of adults that have not been in a bookstore in the past 5 years: 70%

*Total number of U. S. inmates that are literate:  15% *

What is going on here?  What is the root cause?  Are there dots to be connected?

Schools are trying to help children LEARN to read.

What if instead, schools were helping children LOVE to read.

It is great fun to see the light in a child’s eyes, to laugh together and share the joy of discovery, surprise, cleverness, imagination, drama and humor to be found between the covers of a good children’s book.

The love of reading is caught, not taught.

These statistics lead me to think that a tragic number of kids learn to detest reading, or at any rate come to believe it is something to be avoided.

Most tragic of all is the statistic about prison inmates.  Connect these dots:  Lovers of books are never bored or lonely.  Non-readers are often terribly bored and painfully lonely.   They take to the streets for a little action and comradeship.  We all know what happens next.

Hamilton Learning Foundation has plans to simply and delightfully help all children, every single one of them, LOVE to read.

“Statistically, more American children suffer long-term life-harm from the process of learning to read than from parental abuse, accidents and all other childhood disorders combined.  In purely economic terms, reading related difficulties cost our nation more than the war on terrorism, crime and drugs combined.” – – Susan O’hanian

“If you want your children to be bright, read them fairy tales.  If you want them to be brilliant read them even more fairy tales.”  – – Albert Einstein

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

3 thoughts on “READY FOR A SHOCK?

  1. Having grown up in a reading home, I don’t understand not wanting to read. We need more programs like the one many civic clubs and Dolly Parton sponsor called Imagination Library. A book every month to young people.

    • Imagination Library is a truly wonderful program and was so needed in many places in Tennessee. It will undoubtedly change many young lives for the better. Dolly has sent 40 million books to children in the
      U. S., Canada and the U.K. (Seven hundred thousand a month.) Yes, we’re out of the box and, looking back at the box, we can only feel amazed that so many people don’t even know they’re in the box!

      Thank you for your thoughtful comments.

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