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Guest column

Cultivating a contagion of literacy for change

By JIM DUFFEY
Published March 18, 2005

What would you say if I told you I know how to virtually guarantee that your child can become an accomplished reader? What would you say if I told you that while becoming an excellent reader, your child definitely will become a happier, healthier, more fulfilled human being?

I thought so.

By and large, it is a fact that people who read lead happier lives. No one single factor determines the path of one's life the way reading does. Anna Quindlen said as much in her little book How Reading Changed My Life. Rita Mae Brown said, "When I got my library card, that was when my life began."

Bill Cosby recently referred to America's rising illiteracy rate as an "epidemic." Cosby stated adamantly, "Something must be done." He is right on both counts. He was not speaking only of black children. According to recent data from Tallahassee, more than 75 percent of fourth-grade children in Florida are not reading on grade level. Based on my own experience in more than 25 years teaching in public schools, the next step for many of these children will be a diagnosis of "learning disabled." Learning disabilities programs have become a growth industry nationwide.

In an article in Reason magazine in December 2002, Lisa Snell stated in a 2002 report from the President's Commission On Special Education that "80 percent of students who receive an SLD (specific learning disability) diagnosis are assigned to the program simply because they haven't learned how to read." School districts then collect extra funds, called "bounties," for SLD students. All of this because so many learning disabled students are merely people who did not learn the value of the written word when they were very young.

Regarding Cosby's "something," I propose we learn to "brand" reading as the most valuable product in the world. That's right, "brand," as in building brand-name recognition for reading during your child's first five formative years. "Branding" is a term used in industry to promote a product or service by keeping it "in the eyes" of customers as much as possible. Branding reading is a natural way to create interest in reading from a very early age.

Branding experts Faith Popcorn and Laura and Al Ries agree that the most successful brands "win the mind" of customers. Many of the most popular brands win minds early in the life of an individual. Winning the minds of people when they are young builds a committed, long-term customer. Just as the best brand loyalties can last a lifetime, reading can and must become a core value if we are to save our youth from the wasteland of illiteracy.

In the book Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference, author Malcolm Gladwell states that events that can transform a society spread just like an epidemic. In it, he says "the world of the Tipping Point is a place where the unexpected becomes the expected, where radical change is more than possibility. It is - contrary to all our expectations - a certainty." Make literacy a certainty in your home.

We must learn to fight Bill Cosby's epidemic with an epidemic of our own. What are some of the things you can do to begin to brand reading for your children and grandchildren so they achieve their birthright to literacy? Here is a list of things you can begin to do right now in order to brand reading for your children:

Read to them early and often.

Focus on fun with books. Don't worry about reading every page, or making your child read words too soon. Just have fun.

Get them library cards early and use them often. Have a "family library night out."

Get rid of one or more of your televisions. Turn the others off more.

Build a home library. Make it a sacred place where all family members keep some of their books.

Continually use notes to communicate with your kids as well as other members of your household. Be seen writing and reading notes back and forth to one another.

Model reading. Research shows that children will mimic, especially from an early age, what they see others doing.

Try vocal fasting. Spend a part of a day communicating by writing and reading back and forth. As an aside, you will learn something about how much idle chatter you generate every day.

Seek out additional reasons for your children to read and write, like recipes, notes to friends, and the like. There are many good books to help you here. Find them.

Read food labels and menus to improve health.

The more your children see you branding reading, the better - especially when they are very young. Do not expect teachers to do it for you. Even the best ones cannot do what you should have begun years ago. Brand reading as a core value and stick with it. Go get a copy of Dr. Seuss' last book, Oh, the Places You'll Go! Read it aloud with gusto. Brand reading in your house, for a happier, healthier family.

Jim Duffey is a speech-language pathologist in St. Petersburg. Guest columnists write their own views on subjects they choose, which do not necessarily reflect the opinions of this newspaper.

[Last modified March 18, 2005, 00:43:17]