Susannah Patton and Madelyn Holmes, editors
The Council for Basic Education
2002
In our contemporary democracy, being able to read is key to taking advantage of all fundamental freedoms and opportunities. The authors of "The Keys to Literacy" make clear that "very few children with serious reading difficulties ever graduate from college. They suffer disproportionately from social ills such as delinquency and drug abuse. Their job prospects are limited&and they never experience the joys of learning, the opportunities for self-reflection, or the simple pleasures of being lost in a book." Illiteracy creates wasted lives. This report states, however, that "we now know that reading failure can be prevented, but more important, that the timing of intervention is critical." The watchword is EARLY, for "Reading scores in tenth grade can be predicted with surprising accuracy from knowledge of the alphabet in kindergarten." This Council for Basic Education report (first published by in 1998, now expanded and updated) describes in detail how children learn to read, and what adults must do to help teach them. The authors include some of the nation's foremost authorities on literacy and reading instruction. They note that there is now a science of reading that must inform the teaching of reading, and how children are prepared for it while very young. This requires action on several fronts, beginning with nursery rhymes and storybooks from day one. Reading difficulties must be identified in preschool. And, of course, teachers must be better prepared to teach children to read. In short, there is a substantial gap between what works and what most of today's parents and educators actually do. That gap must be filled if all our children are to maximize their potential. Hence parents and educators will want the information in "The Keys to Literacy," which can be found at
http://www.c-b-e.org/PDF/KeystoLiteracy2002.pdf.