When was the last time you appreciated the ability to read? For me, never. I’ve never finished a book and marveled at the feat I just accomplished. I really should because reading is amazing!
I can look at these squiggles and recognize that they have meaning. They stand for a sound. I can then put the little sounds together to form words, which are entities with their own meaning. I can take the meaning of the individual words, scan them in order, and understand a complete thought or sentence. Each thought has it’s own meaning but when read together as a series, like in a paragraph, they combine to describe even more complex ideas like why the Roman Empire collapsed.
While reading this post your brain is doing some awesome computing and for you, it probably seems effortless. This is not the case for everyone. I’m not even talking about people with physical differences in their brain that impede reading. I’m referring to people who, for whatever reason, missed out on being taught how to read.
Our brains, thanks to thousands of years of evolution, are programmed for language learning. Drop a three year old anywhere in the world and she’ll learn to speak the language without any intervention. If your brain were a computer, it comes with the language learning software pre-installed. This is not the case for reading. Reading cannot simply be acquired.
Written language was developed much more recently in human history and our brains do not yet come with this software. It has to be manually installed one lesson at a time. Basically, I’ve come to understand that learning to read requires a teacher. If someone doesn’t have the teacher or the time to practice, she will never read.
Why am I thinking about literacy? Yesterday, our maid stopped in front of a map we had out for framing. She asked my husband, “Is this a map of the United States?” My husband, without missing a beat, said off handedly, “Oh no, that’s a map of the world. Here’s Brazil and here’s Africa. Up here is the United States.” I froze at the question and the realization that here was an adult who didn’t know what the world looked like. It blew my mind. My husband pointed out later that not recognizing the map means very little, if any schooling, so she probably is functionally illiterate.
I think her question threw me because I had not put her in my “unfortunate circumstance” category. Our maid is responsible, hard working, a great cook and keeps her word. If we agree on next Tuesday morning, she shows up next Tuesday on time without a single reminder. She is proactive and will clean or fix things that need it but that I haven’t necessarily mentioned. She has raised a family. I’ve worked with people not half as competent. But she doesn’t know what a map of the world looks like. And probably doesn’t read.
I’ve been thinking about that ten second exchange since yesterday. The best response I have so far is to be thankful. I am going to be grateful for my good, free schools. I’m going to appreciate that my parents could afford to let me be a full time student. A good education is not, unfortunately, a guarantee in life. I’m going to be grateful for mine and what an awesome reader I became as a result.
