A view on illiteracy.

jedi_Lou · Subject: A view on illiteracy. Tue Dec 04, 2007 12:29 pm

In a survey conducted
by the Asian Development Bank (ADB), the Philippines’ adult literacy rate as of 2000-2004 is 92.6%. This was supported by another institution, the
Human Development Report, finding exactly the same rate.

Each year since 1990, the Human Development Report
has published the human development index (HDI) that looks beyond GDP (Gross
Domestic Product) to a broader definition of well-being. The index is not in
any sense a comprehensive measure of human development. What it does provide is
a broadened prism for viewing human progress and the complex relationship
between income and well-being.

The HDI provides a composite measure of three
dimensions of human development:

living a long and healthy life (measured by life
expectancy),

being educated (measured by adult literacy and
enrolment at the primary, secondary and tertiary level),

and having a decent standard of living (measured by
purchasing power parity, PPP, income).

The HDI for Philippines
is 0.763, which gives Philippines
a rank of 84th out of 177 countries with data.

However, in 1994, the government’s survey revealed a
simple literacy rate of 93.9. The aim of the then Department of Education,
Culture, and Sports (DECS) was to raise that rate to 98% by year 2000. An unmet
goal.

2004’s HDI, highlights the very large gaps in
well-being and life chances that continue to divide our increasingly
interconnected world. By looking at some of the most fundamental aspects of
people’s lives and opportunities, it provides a much more complete picture of a
country’s development than other indicators, such as GDP per capita.

Why is illiteracy still predominant?

Vincent Greaney emphasizes that in addition to lack
of quality reading materials, other key reasons for illiteracy include:

Health problems - e.g., malnutrition annually causes
blindness in up to a million children.

Gender inequality - in developing countries,
illiteracy among females stands at 45% versus 25% for males, due in part to
girls’ lower school attendance.

Unfavourable home conditions - e.g., poverty often
leaves homes without space and light for reading and forces children to spend
their time working rather than reading.

School deficiencies - e.g., teachers often lack
training and livable salaries.

JoÜo Oliviera notes that in many developing
countries, textbooks are scarce. Indeed, while many reading experts advice
against over-reliance on textbooks, many teachers are thankful just to have
them; because in many schools, textbooks provide the sole source of written
language for their students. Further, textbooks supply guidance on what to
teach and how to teach it.

Reading researcher Richard Anderson adds that if students
read just 15 minutes a day in school and 15 minutes a day outside school, they will
be reading more than a total of 1 million words per year. If 20,000 of these
are new words and, as research suggests, at least 5% of these are learned, Anderson estimates 1000
words a year will be learned, much more than would normally be learned by direct
vocabulary instruction. Reading
also surpasses oral language via conversation and TV as a source of vocabulary
enrichment. Anderson
cites one study which found that even comic books provided at least two times
richer lexical environment for children than did talking with adults.

You probably have access to large amounts of reading
material via libraries, bookstores, and the internet. Indeed, nowadays we hear
about people suffering "information fatigue" from all the material
out there to read. However, we should remember that a significant proportion of
the world’s population lack the ability to read, in part because they lack
access to sufficient materials to read. The supply of potentially donatable
books is huge, e.g., just in the U.S., every year 40 million new
books are destroyed and a minimum of 2-4 million are donated.

The small gesture of
donating books is an essential step to raising the nation’s literacy rate. If
for any inspiration, South Korea had an illiteracy rate of 78% in 1945. Today, that
rate is well below 4%.

Addendum:

Table 1: Philippines’s human development index 2004
HDI value	Life expectancy at birth (years)	Adult literacy rate (% ages 15 and older)	Combined primary, secondary and tertiary gross enrolment ratio (%)	GDP per capita (PPP US$)
<table class="MsoNormalTable" style="width: 100%;" border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="1" width="100%"> <tr style=""> <td style="padding: 3.75pt;"> 1. Norway (0.965) </td> </tr> <tr style=""> <td style="padding: 3.75pt;"> 82. Peru (0.767) </td> </tr> <tr style=""> <td style="padding: 3.75pt;"> 83. Ecuador (0.765) </td> </tr> <tr style=""> <td style="padding: 3.75pt;"> 84. Philippines (0.763) </td> </tr> <tr style=""> <td style="padding: 3.75pt;"> 85. Grenada (0.762) </td> </tr> <tr style=""> <td style="padding: 3.75pt;"> 86. Jordan (0.760) </td> </tr> </table> 177. Niger (0.311)	<table class="MsoNormalTable" style="width: 100%;" border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="1" width="100%"> <tr style=""> <td style="padding: 3.75pt;"> 1. Japan (82.2) </td> </tr> <tr style=""> <td style="padding: 3.75pt;"> 85. Iran, Islamic Rep. of (70.7) </td> </tr> <tr style=""> <td style="padding: 3.75pt;"> 86. Jamaica (70.7) </td> </tr> <tr style=""> <td style="padding: 3.75pt;"> 87. Philippines (70.7) </td> </tr> <tr style=""> <td style="padding: 3.75pt;"> 88. Cape Verde (70.7) </td> </tr> <tr style=""> <td style="padding: 3.75pt;"> 89. Georgia (70.6) </td> </tr> </table> 177. Swaziland (31.3)	<table class="MsoNormalTable" style="width: 100%;" border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="1" width="100%"> <tr style=""> <td style="padding: 3.75pt;"> 1. Georgia (100.0) </td> </tr> <tr style=""> <td style="padding: 3.75pt;"> 43. Brunei Darussalam (92.7) </td> </tr> <tr style=""> <td style="padding: 3.75pt;"> 44. Thailand (92.6) </td> </tr> <tr style=""> <td style="padding: 3.75pt;"> 45. Philippines (92.6) </td> </tr> <tr style=""> <td style="padding: 3.75pt;"> 46. Singapore (92.5) </td> </tr> <tr style=""> <td style="padding: 3.75pt;"> 47. Occupied Palestinian Territories (92.4) </td> </tr> </table> 128. Mali (19.0)	<table class="MsoNormalTable" style="width: 100%;" border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="1" width="100%"> <tr style=""> <td style="padding: 3.75pt;"> 1. Australia (113.2) </td> </tr> <tr style=""> <td style="padding: 3.75pt;"> 44. Lebanon (83. </td> </tr> <tr style=""> <td style="padding: 3.75pt;"> 45. Dominica (82. </td> </tr> <tr style=""> <td style="padding: 3.75pt;"> 46. Philippines (81.5) </td> </tr> <tr style=""> <td style="padding: 3.75pt;"> 47. Chile (81.3) </td> </tr> <tr style=""> <td style="padding: 3.75pt;"> 48. Malta (81.3) </td> </tr> </table> 172. Niger (21.5)	<table class="MsoNormalTable" style="width: 100%;" border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="1" width="100%"> <tr style=""> <td style="padding: 3.75pt;"> 1. Luxembourg (69,961) </td> </tr> <tr style=""> <td style="padding: 3.75pt;"> 98. Paraguay (4,813) </td> </tr> <tr style=""> <td style="padding: 3.75pt;"> 99. Jordan (4,688) </td> </tr> <tr style=""> <td style="padding: 3.75pt;"> 100. Philippines (4,614) </td> </tr> <tr style=""> <td style="padding: 3.75pt;"> 101. Turkmenistan (4,584) </td> </tr> <tr style=""> <td style="padding: 3.75pt;"> 102. Guyana (4,439) </td> </tr> </table> 172. Sierra Leone (561)

jedi_Lou · Subject: Re: A view on illiteracy. Sat Jan 05, 2008 11:17 am

-mod, padelete man daytoy. hehehe. nagkakalat. naggulo jay formatting na met lang.

*thanks*

R569 · Number of posts: 60 Registration date: 2008-01-04

jedi_Lou · Subject: Re: A view on illiteracy. Sat Jan 05, 2008 3:25 pm

hahaha. hilain ko ngala-ngala mo eh. hehehe