importance of literacy essay

Literacy Definition and Importance Essay

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Education is an important aspect in the economy of a country. It is a measure of a country’s potential human capital. Compared to their counterparts-illiterate people, literate people in a community not only have higher social status but also enjoy better employment and wealth prospects. The higher the literacy level, the better placed is a country in terms of its ability to spear head its set development goals/objectives. This paper seeks to give a backbone of the term ‘literacy’ and its justification.

Literacy is the process of learning whereby an individual gains the ability to understand and convey written information, gain new skills from the information, teach those skills and apply the acquired knowledge and skills for the benefit of the society. Here the key words are gain, ability to understand, teach, apply, and for a benefit. However, different people have defined literacy differently in different periods. Traditionally, people defined literacy as the ability to read, appropriately use written information and appropriately write in a range of contexts (Winch, 2007, p. 20). However, there have been new aspects arising from the definition.

This definition does not involve critical thinking in the application of the information retrieved from the written sources. It remains insufficient since it does not account for several aspects that are significant as far as literacy is concerned.

Most people perceive that literacy comprises of a set of several tangible skills, which include the cognitive skills of reading and writing. These skills ought to be independent of the context of acquiring them and the background of the individual who acquires them (Adams, 1993, p. 24). The individual should be able to decode phonetics, spelling, word recognition and vocabulary. This implies that one should not depend on pictures to denote meaning. There is emphasis on both the ability to understand orally given information and the ability to present it as written literature.

In the recent past, various scholars have started using the term ‘literacy’ in a much broader metaphorical sense to refer to other skills and competencies, for example ‘information literacy’, ‘visual literacy’, ‘media literacy’, ‘computer literacy’ and ‘scientific literacy’ (Hills, 2006, p. 6). The introduction of these concepts has brought a shift from the view of literacy as a set of words but also the interpretation of signs, symbols, pictures and sounds, which vary by social context (Cope & Kalantzis, 2000, p. 5). These skills enable an individual to gather and apply knowledge in different contexts.

An addition to the contemporary definitions of literacy is that it should be a learning process in which, individuals continually acquire knowledge and skills and use those skills for the benefit of the society (Rogoff, 2003, p. 6). According to National Inquiry into the Teaching of Literacy, learning to read and the teaching of reading is usually included within the broader area of literacy (2005, p. 7). Therefore, the literacy learning system should focus on strategies that are investigative, reflective, tailored, tested, embedded, purposively practiced and shared.

In conclusion, literacy includes gaining knowledge, being able to understand, to teach, to apply, and to use for a specific benefit. These aspects are equally important and therefore absence of either may translate to illiteracy. For this reason, when assessing literacy level, it is important to consider all the aspects. It applies in all fields.

Adams, R. P. (1993). Juniperus: Flora of North America North of Mexico , Vol. 2. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Web.

Cope, B., & Kalantzis, M. (2000). Multiliteracies: Literacy learning and the design of social futures. London: Routledge. Web.

Hill, S. (2006). Developing early literacy: assessment and teaching . Vic: Eleanor. Web.

Curtain Pub. National Inquiry into the Teaching of Literacy. (2005). Report and Recommendations . Australia: Common Wealth of Australia. Web.

Rogoff, B. (2003). The cultural nature of human development . Oxford: Oxford UniversityPress. Web.

Winch, G. (2007). Literacy: reading, writing and children’s literature 3 rd Ed. Victoria: Oxford university press. Web.

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Literacy is More than Just Reading and Writing

NCTE 03.23.20 Diversity

From the NCTE Standing Committee on Global Citizenship

This post was written by NCTE member Amber Peterson, a member of the NCTE Standing Committee on Global Citizenship.

“History is written by the victors.” —Unknown

As committee members, we regularly wrestle with pinning down a comprehensive definition of literacy. The common definition, “the ability to read and write,” gets increasingly complex upon closer examination. What does mastery of reading and writing look like? How do we measure it? How do we weigh digital and technological proficiency? Where does numeracy come in? How do the values of our communities and cultural practices come into play? sWhen measuring literacy, which languages and dialects count and which do not?

Despite the complexity, literacy is the global metric we use to assess the health and competence of communities. High literacy rates have been found to correlate to everything from better access to economic opportunity, to better nutrition, to environmental sustainability.

In fact, bolstering global literacy underpins all of UNESCO’s 2030 Sustainability Goals, acknowledging the fact that ideals like gender equality, sustainable infrastructure, and eradicating poverty and hunger are not possible without literate populations. Correspondingly, UNESCO’s hefty definition of literacy is “a means of identification, understanding, interpretation, creation, and communication in an increasingly digital, text-mediated, information-rich and fast-changing world.” (UNESCO)

This focus on literacy as a tool for meaningful engagement with society makes sense. As our population expands and technology breaks down ever more barriers between us, the ability to communicate and interact with those around us becomes even more important. In our consideration of literacy, however, it is impossible to ignore the myriad ways that imperialist and colonialist systems shape gender and regional disparities in access.

Many historians propose that written language emerged at least in part as a tool for maintaining power. One’s class status dictated one’s access to literacy education, and often those without power were prohibited from learning to read and write at all. Colonialism, imperialism, and the sprawl of anglo-european, male-centered ideology from the 15th Century onward have created global power structures that still dominate today.

When considered from that perspective, it is no surprise that women make up two thirds of the world’s illiterate population, and that sub-Saharan Africa, the region arguably hit hardest by many of those inequitable power structures, has some of the lowest literacy levels in the world.

While our focus must and should be on providing everyone everywhere with the tools to “identify, understand, interpret, create, and communicate in an increasingly digital, text-mediated, information-rich, and fast changing world,” those persistent inequitable power structures dictate that progress will always be lopsided and slow.

As we slog onward, perhaps we also need to examine and consider more closely the world and experience of the “illiterate” as well. Only relatively recently has literacy been expected or even possible for the vast majority of society. For centuries, people have lived, laughed, traded, communicated, and survived without being able to read and write. Even today, though illiteracy can be a literal death sentence (studies have shown that female literacy rates can actually be a predictor of child mortality rates (Saurabh et al)), it is most certainly a metaphorical one wherein the experiences had and contributions made by those so afflicted are devalued both by design and by conceit.

We doom entire cultures and erase the experiences of entire populations by embracing the superiority of those who are literate, but illiteracy doesn’t mean ignorance. We can and should learn from everyone and we must provide other avenues to global citizenship for those who can’t read and write.

So what does this mean for our definition of literacy? At its simplest, literacy is the way that we interact with the world around us, how we shape it and are shaped by it. It is how we communicate with others via reading and writing, but also by speaking, listening, and creating. It is how we articulate our experience in the world and declare, “We Are Here!”

In my work as the director of program innovation for LitWorld, I get to interact with young people all over the world and examine the idea of literacy from many different angles. Resources for literacy education differ dramatically from one place to another, as do metric taking procedures and general best practices.

What does not change is the inherent drive for people to express themselves, to learn, and to grow. I see the enthusiasm with which young people jump at the chance to share stories of themselves and of the world, to be listened to and to absorb. I also see firsthand the devastating effect of being told that your story, your community, and your culture do not matter. I have witnessed the loss of confidence, the dwindling self-esteem, and the cycle of hopelessness that comes with the silencing of voices.

It is our charge as educators and as global citizens to embrace literacy in ALL of its forms.

5 Suggestions for Embracing Literacy for Global Citizenship in the Classroom

• Focus on students’ own stories . Find ways to center their experiences and lean in to opportunities to share them both informally and formally.
• Embrace ALL of the languages your students speak. Being multilingual is an asset, not a deficit! Many of our students are multilingual in ways we never acknowledge. Mastery of formal and standardized language structures is an important tool that every student deserves access to, but life often happens outside of and around those structures. Those everyday interactions are important, valuable, and valid as well.
• Provide regular access to diverse stories, images, experiences, and perspectives. The world is enormous and that diversity is beautiful. Help your students to see it as such. Providing access to underrepresented narratives and accounts helps to decolonize your classroom and normalize embracing the unfamiliar.
• Place value on reading, writing, speaking, listening, and creating in your students’ work. Ensure that reading and writing are not the only ways in which students are acknowledged and celebrated for taking in ideas, expressing their thoughts, or demonstrating understanding. Encouraging multiple modes of expression not only provides more opportunities for students to explore and display their own intelligence, it also primes them to seek information, inspiration, and knowledge from diverse sources.
• Read aloud together, and often . Reading aloud is effective across grade levels, despite the fact that this critical practice usually stops in elementary school. Reading aloud can provide access to content that students might not be able to access on their own. It is also a way of creating community and building a shared experience as a whole class.

The Standing Committee on Global Citizenship works to identify and address issues of broad concern to NCTE members interested in promoting global citizenship and connections across global contexts within the Council and within members’ teaching contexts.

Literacy. (2018, March 19). Retrieved March 2, 2020, from https://en.unesco.org/themes/literacy

Saurabh, S., Sarkar, S., & Pandey, D. K. (2013). Female Literacy Rate is a Better Predictor of Birth Rate and Infant Mortality Rate in India. Retrieved March 2, 2020, from https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4649870/

The Sustainable Development Agenda—United Nations Sustainable Development. (n.d.). Retrieved March 2, 2020, from https://www.un.org/sustainabledevelopment/development-agenda/

What you need to know about literacy

What is the global situation in relation to literacy.

Great progress has been made in literacy with most recent data (UNESCO Institute for Statistics) showing that more than 86 per cent of the world’s population know how to read and write compared to 68 per cent in 1979. Despite this, worldwide at least 765 million adults still cannot read and write, two thirds of them women, and 250 million children are failing to acquire basic literacy skills. Before the COVID-19 pandemic, which caused the worst disruption to education in a century, 617 million children and teenagers had not reached minimum reading levels.   

How does UNESCO define literacy?

Acquiring literacy is not a one-off act. Beyond its conventional concept as a set of reading, writing and counting skills, literacy is now understood as a means of identification, understanding, interpretation, creation, and communication in an increasingly digital, text-mediated, information-rich and fast-changing world. Literacy is a continuum of learning and proficiency in reading, writing and using numbers throughout life and is part of a larger set of skills, which include digital skills, media literacy, education for sustainable development and global citizenship as well as job-specific skills. Literacy skills themselves are expanding and evolving as people engage more and more with information and learning through digital technology.  

What are the effects of literacy?

Literacy empowers and liberates people. Beyond its importance as part of the right to education, literacy improves lives by expanding capabilities which in turn reduces poverty, increases participation in the labour market and has positive effects on health and sustainable development. Women empowered by literacy have a positive ripple effect on all aspects of development. They have greater life choices for themselves and an immediate impact on the health and education of their families, and in particular, the education of girl children.  

How does UNESCO work to promote literacy?

UNESCO works through its global network, field offices and institutes and with its Member States and partners to advance literacy in the framework of lifelong learning, and address the literacy target 4.6 in SDG4 and the Education 2030 Framework for Action . Its Strategy for Youth and Adult Literacy (2020-2025) pays special attention to the member countries of the Global Alliance for Literacy which targets 20 countries with an adult literacy rate below 50 per cent and the E9 countries, of which 17 are in Africa. The focus is on promoting literacy in formal and non-formal settings with four priority areas: strengthening national strategies and policy development on literacy; addressing the needs of disadvantaged groups, particularly women and girls; using digital technologies to expand and improve learning outcomes; and monitoring progress and assessing literacy skills. UNESCO also promotes adult learning and education through its Institute for Lifelong Learning , including the implementation of the 2015 Recommendation on Adult Learning and Education and its monitoring through the Global Report on Adult Learning and Education. 

What is digital literacy and why is it important?

UNESCO defines digital literacy as the ability to access, manage, understand, integrate, communicate, evaluate and create information safely and appropriately through digital technologies for employment, decent jobs and entrepreneurship. It includes skills such as computer literacy, ICT literacy, information literacy and media literacy which aim to empower people, and in particular youth, to adopt a critical mindset when engaging with information and digital technologies, and to build their resilience in the face of disinformation, hate speech and violent extremism.

How is UNESCO helping advance girls' and women's literacy?

UNESCO’s Global Partnership for Women and Girls Education, launched in 2011, emphasizes quality education for girls and women at the secondary level and in the area of literacy; its Literacy Initiative for Empowerment (LIFE) project (2005–15) targeted women; and UNESCO’s international literacy prizes regularly highlight the life-changing power of meeting women’s and girls’ needs for literacy in specific contexts. Literacy acquisition often brings with it positive change in relation to harmful traditional practices, forms of marginalization and deprivation. Girls’ and women’s literacy seen as lifelong learning is integral to achieving the aims of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.  

How has youth and adult literacy been impacted in times of COVID-19?

Since the start of the pandemic, several surveys have been conducted but very little is still known about the effect on youth and adult literacy of massive disruptions to learning, growing inequalities and projected increases in school dropouts. To fill this gap UNESCO will conduct a global survey “Learning from the COVID-19 crisis to write the future: National policies and programmes for youth and adult literacy” collecting information from countries worldwide regarding the situation and policy and programme responses. Its results will help UNESCO, countries and other partners respond better to the recovery phase and advance progress towards achieving Sustainable Development Goal 4 on education and its target 4.6 on youth and adult literacy. In addition, for International Literacy Day 2020, UNESCO prepared a background paper on the impact of the crisis on youth and adult literacy.

What is the purpose of the Literacy Prize and Literacy Day?

Every year since 1967, UNESCO celebrates International Literacy Day and rewards outstanding and innovative programmes that promote literacy through the International Literacy Prizes. Every year on 8 September UNESCO comes together for the annual celebration with Field Offices, institutes, NGOs, teachers, learners and partners to remind the world of the importance of literacy as a matter of dignity and human rights. The event emphasizes the power of literacy and creates awareness to advance the global agenda towards a more literate and sustainable society. 

The International Literacy Prizes reward excellence and innovation in the field of literacy and, so far, over 506 projects and programmes undertaken by governments, non-governmental organizations and individuals around the world have been recognized. Following an annual call for submissions, an International Jury of experts appointed by UNESCO's Director-General recommends potential prizewinning programmes. Candidates are submitted by Member States or by international non-governmental organizations in official partnership with UNESCO.

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Chapter 1. What is Literacy? Multiple Perspectives on Literacy

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Keywords: literacy, digital literacy, critical literacy, community-based literacies

Definitions of literacy from multiple perspectives

Literacy is the cornerstone of education by any definition. Literacy refers to the ability of people to read and write (UNESCO, 2017). Reading and writing in turn are about encoding and decoding information between written symbols and sound (Resnick, 1983; Tyner, 1998). More specifically, literacy is the ability to understand the relationship between sounds and written words such that one may read, say, and understand them (UNESCO, 2004; Vlieghe, 2015). About 67 percent of children nationwide, and more than 80 percent of those from families with low incomes, are not proficient readers by the end of third grade ( The Nation Assessment for Educational Progress; NAEP 2022 ).  Children who are not reading on grade level by third grade are 4 times more likely to drop out of school than their peers who are reading on grade level. A large body of research clearly demonstrates that Americans with fewer years of education have poorer health and shorter lives. In fact, since the 1990s, life expectancy has fallen for people without a high school education. Completing more years of education creates better access to health insurance, medical care, and the resources for living a healthier life (Saha, 2006). Americans with less education face higher rates of illness, higher rates of disability, and shorter life expectancies. In the U.S., 25-year-olds without a high school diploma can expect to die 9 years sooner than college graduates. For example, by 2011, the prevalence of diabetes had reached 15% for adults without a high -school education, compared with 7% for college graduates (Zimmerman et al., 2018).

Thus, literacy is a goal of utmost importance to society. But what does it mean to be literate, or to be able to read? What counts as literacy?

Learning Objectives

• Describe two or more definitions of literacy and the differences between them.
• Define digital and critical literacy.
• Distinguish between digital literacy, critical literacy, and community-based literacies.
• Explain multiple perspectives on literacy.

Here are some definitions to consider:

“Literacy is the ability to identify, understand, interpret, create, communicate, and compute, using printed and written materials associated with varying contexts. Literacy involves a continuum of learning in enabling individuals to achieve their goals, to develop their knowledge and potential, and to participate fully in their community and wider society.” – United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO)

“The ability to understand, use, and respond appropriately to written texts.” – National Center for Education Statistics (NCES), citing the Program for the International Assessment of Adult Competencies (PIAAC)

“An individual’s ability to read, write, and speak in English, compute, and solve problems, at levels of proficiency necessary to function on the job, in the family of the individual, and in society.” – Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act (WIOA), Section 203

“The ability to identify, understand, interpret, create, communicate, and compute, using printed and written materials associated with varying contexts. Literacy involves a continuum of learning in enabling individuals to achieve their goals, to develop their knowledge and potential, and to participate fully in their community and wider society.” – Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development’s (OECD) Program for the International Assessment of Adult Competencies (PIAAC), as cited by the American Library Association’s Committee on Literacy

“Using printed and written information to function in society, to achieve one’s goals, and to develop one’s knowledge and potential.” – Kutner, Greenberg, Jin, Boyle, Hsu, & Dunleavy (2007). Literacy in Everyday Life: Results from the 2003 National Assessment of Adult Literacy (NCES 2007-480)

Which one of these above definitions resonates with you? Why?

New literacy practices as meaning-making practices

In the 21 st century, literacy increasingly includes understanding the roles of digital media and technology in literacy. In 1996, the New London Group coined the term “multiliteracies” or “new literacies” to describe a modern view of literacy that reflected multiple communication forms and contexts of cultural and linguistic diversity within a globalized society. They defined multiliteracies as a combination of multiple ways of communicating and making meaning, including such modes as visual, audio, spatial, behavioral, and gestural (New London Group, 1996). Most of the text’s students come across today are digital (like this textbook!). Instead of books and magazines, students are reading blogs and text messages.

For a short video on the importance of digital literacy, watch The New Media Literacies .

The National Council for Teachers of English (NCTE, 2019) makes it clear that our definitions of literacy must continue to evolve and grow ( NCTE definition of digital literacy ).

“Literacy has always been a collection of communicative and sociocultural practices shared among communities. As society and technology change, so does literacy. The world demands that a literate person possess and intentionally apply a wide range of skills, competencies, and dispositions. These literacies are interconnected, dynamic, and malleable. As in the past, they are inextricably linked with histories, narratives, life possibilities, and social trajectories of all individuals and groups. Active, successful participants in a global society must be able to:

• participate effectively and critically in a networked world.
• explore and engage critically and thoughtfully across a wide variety of inclusive texts and tools/modalities.
• consume, curate, and create actively across contexts.
• advocate for equitable access to and accessibility of texts, tools, and information.
• build and sustain intentional global and cross-cultural connections and relationships with others to pose and solve problems collaboratively and strengthen independent thought.
• promote culturally sustaining communication and recognize the bias and privilege present in the interactions.
• examine the rights, responsibilities, and ethical implications of the use and creation of information.
• determine how and to what extent texts and tools amplify one’s own and others’ narratives as well as counterproductive narratives.
• recognize and honor the multilingual literacy identities and culture experiences individuals bring to learning environments, and provide opportunities to promote, amplify, and encourage these variations of language (e.g., dialect, jargon, and register).”

In other words, literacy is not just the ability to read and write. It is also being able to effectively use digital technology to find and analyze information. Students who are digitally literate know how to do research, find reliable sources, and make judgments about what they read online and in print. Next, we will learn more about digital literacy.

• Malleable : can be changed.
• Culturally sustaining : the pedagogical preservation of the cultural and linguistic competence of young people pertaining to their communities of origin while simultaneously affording dominant-culture competence.
• Bias : a tendency to believe that some people, ideas, etc., are better than others, usually resulting in unfair treatment.
• Privilege : a right or benefit that is given to some people and not to others.
• Unproductive narrative : negative commonly held beliefs such as “all students from low-income backgrounds will struggle in school.” (Narratives are phrases or ideas that are repeated over and over and become “shared narratives.” You can spot them in common expressions and stories that almost everyone knows and holds as ingrained values or beliefs.)

Literacy in the digital age

The Iowa Core recognizes that today, literacy includes technology. The goal for students who graduate from the public education system in Iowa is:

“Each Iowa student will be empowered with the technological knowledge and skills to learn effectively and live productively. This vision, developed by the Iowa Core 21st Century Skills Committee, reflects the fact that Iowans in the 21st century live in a global environment marked by a high use of technology, giving citizens and workers the ability to collaborate and make individual contributions as never before. Iowa’s students live in a media-suffused environment, marked by access to an abundance of information and rapidly changing technological tools useful for critical thinking and problem-solving processes. Therefore, technological literacy supports preparation of students as global citizens capable of self-directed learning in preparation for an ever-changing world” (Iowa Core Standards 21 st Century Skills, n.d.).

NOTE: The essential concepts and skills of technology literacy are taken from the International Society for Technology in Education’s National Educational Technology Standards for Students: Grades K-2 | Technology Literacy Standards

Literacy in any context is defined as the ability “ to access, manage, integrate, evaluate, and create information in order to function in a knowledge society” (ICT Literacy Panel, 2002). “ When we teach only for facts (specifics)… rather than for how to go beyond facts, we teach students how to get out of date ” (Sternberg, 2008). This statement is particularly significant when applied to technology literacy. The Iowa essential concepts for technology literacy reflect broad, universal processes and skills.

Unlike the previous generations, learning in the digital age is marked using rapidly evolving technology, a deluge of information, and a highly networked global community (Dede, 2010). In such a dynamic environment, learners need skills beyond the basic cognitive ability to consume and process language. To understand the characteristics of the digital age, and what this means for how people learn in this new and changing landscape, one may turn to the evolving discussion of literacy or, as one might say now, of digital literacy. The history of literacy contextualizes digital literacy and illustrates changes in literacy over time. By looking at literacy as an evolving historical phenomenon, we can glean the fundamental characteristics of the digital age. These characteristics in turn illuminate the skills needed to take advantage of digital environments. The following discussion is an overview of digital literacy, its essential components, and why it is important for learning in the digital age.

Literacy is often considered a skill or competency. Children and adults alike can spend years developing the appropriate skills for encoding and decoding information. Over the course of thousands of years, literacy has become much more common and widespread, with a global literacy rate ranging from 81% to 90% depending on age and gender (UNESCO, 2016). From a time when literacy was the domain of an elite few, it has grown to include huge swaths of the global population. There are several reasons for this, not the least of which are some of the advantages the written word can provide. Kaestle (1985) tells us that “literacy makes it possible to preserve information as a snapshot in time, allows for recording, tracking and remembering information, and sharing information more easily across distances among others” (p. 16). In short, literacy led “to the replacement of myth by history and the replacement of magic by skepticism and science.”

If literacy involves the skills of reading and writing, digital literacy requires the ability to extend those skills to effectively take advantage of the digital world (American Library Association [ALA], 2013). More general definitions express digital literacy as the ability to read and understand information from digital sources as well as to create information in various digital formats (Bawden, 2008; Gilster, 1997; Tyner, 1998; UNESCO, 2004). Developing digital skills allows digital learners to manage a vast array of rapidly changing information and is key to both learning and working in the evolving digital landscape (Dede, 2010; Koltay, 2011; Mohammadyari & Singh, 2015). As such, it is important for people to develop certain competencies specifically for handling digital content.

ALA Digital Literacy Framework

To fully understand the many digital literacies, we will look at the American Library Association (ALA) framework. The ALA framework is laid out in terms of basic functions with enough specificity to make it easy to understand and remember but broad enough to cover a wide range of skills. The ALA framework includes the following areas:

• understanding,
• evaluating,
• creating, and
• communicating (American Library Association, 2013).

Finding information in a digital environment represents a significant departure from the way human beings have searched for information for centuries. The learner must abandon older linear or sequential approaches to finding information such as reading a book, using a card catalog, index, or table of contents, and instead use more horizontal approaches like natural language searches, hypermedia text, keywords, search engines, online databases and so on (Dede, 2010; Eshet, 2002). The shift involves developing the ability to create meaningful search limits (SCONUL, 2016). Previously, finding the information would have meant simply looking up page numbers based on an index or sorting through a card catalog. Although finding information may depend to some degree on the search tool being used (library, internet search engine, online database, etc.) the search results also depend on how well a person is able to generate appropriate keywords and construct useful Boolean searches. Failure in these two areas could easily return too many results to be helpful, vague, or generic results, or potentially no useful results at all (Hangen, 2015).

Part of the challenge of finding information is the ability to manage the results. Because there is so much data, changing so quickly, in so many different formats, it can be challenging to organize and store them in such a way as to be useful. SCONUL (2016) talks about this as the ability to organize, store, manage, and cite digital resources, while the Educational Testing Service also specifically mentions the skills of accessing and managing information. Some ways to accomplish these tasks is using social bookmarking tools such as Diigo, clipping and organizing software such as Evernote and OneNote, and bibliographic software. Many sites, such as YouTube, allow individuals with an account to bookmark videos, as well as create channels or collections of videos for specific topics or uses. Other websites have similar features.

Understanding

Understanding in the context of digital literacy perhaps most closely resembles traditional literacy because it is the ability to read and interpret text (Jones-Kavalier & Flannigan, 2006). In the digital age, however, the ability to read and understand extends much further than text alone. For example, searches may return results with any combination of text, video, sound, and audio, as well as still and moving pictures. As the internet has evolved, a whole host of visual languages have also evolved, such as moving images, emoticons, icons, data visualizations, videos, and combinations of all the above. Lankshear & Knoble (2008) refer to these modes of communication as “post typographic textual practice.” Understanding the variety of modes of digital material may also be referred to as multimedia literacy (Jones-Kavalier & Flannigan, 2006), visual literacy (Tyner, 1998), or digital literacy (Buckingham, 2006).

Evaluating digital media requires competencies ranging from assessing the importance of a piece of information to determining its accuracy and source. Evaluating information is not new to the digital age, but the nature of digital information can make it more difficult to understand who the source of information is and whether it can be trusted (Jenkins, 2018). When there are abundant and rapidly changing data across heavily populated networks, anyone with access can generate information online. This results in the learner needing to make decisions about its authenticity, trustworthiness, relevance, and significance. Learning evaluative digital skills means learning to ask questions about who is writing the information, why they are writing it, and who the intended audience is (Buckingham, 2006). Developing critical thinking skills is part of the literacy of evaluating and assessing the suitability for use of a specific piece of information (SCONUL, 2016).

Creating in the digital world makes the production of knowledge and ideas in digital formats explicit. While writing is a critical component of traditional literacy, it is not the only creative tool in the digital toolbox. Other tools are available and include creative activities such as podcasting, making audio-visual presentations, building data visualizations, 3D printing, and writing blogs. Tools that haven’t been thought of before are constantly appearing. In short, a digitally literate individual will want to be able to use all formats in which digital information may be conveyed in the creation of a product. A key component of creating with digital tools is understanding what constitutes fair use and what is considered plagiarism. While this is not new to the digital age, it may be more challenging these days to find the line between copying and extending someone else’s work.

In part, the reason for the increased difficulty in discerning between plagiarism and new work is the “cut and paste culture” of the Internet, referred to as “reproduction literacy” (Eshet 2002, p.4), or appropriation in Jenkins’ New Media Literacies (Jenkins, 2018). The question is, what kind and how much change is required to avoid the accusation of plagiarism? This skill requires the ability to think critically, evaluate a work, and make appropriate decisions. There are tools and information to help understand and find those answers, such as the Creative Commons. Learning about such resources and how to use them is part of digital literacy.

Communicating

Communicating is the final category of digital skills in the ALA digital framework. The capacity to connect with individuals all over the world creates unique opportunities for learning and sharing information, for which developing digital communication skills is vital. Some of the skills required for communicating in the digital environment include digital citizenship, collaboration, and cultural awareness. This is not to say that one does not need to develop communication skills outside of the digital environment, but that the skills required for digital communication go beyond what is required in a non-digital environment. Most of us are adept at personal, face- to-face communication, but digital communication needs the ability to engage in asynchronous environments such as email, online forums, blogs, social media, and learning platforms where what is written may not be deleted and may be misinterpreted. Add that to an environment where people number in the millions and the opportunities for misunderstanding and cultural miscues are likely.

The communication category of digital literacies covers an extensive array of skills above and beyond what one might need for face-to-face interactions. It is comprised of competencies around ethical and moral behavior, responsible communication for engagement in social and civic activities (Adam Becker et al., 2017), an awareness of audience, and an ability to evaluate the potential impact of one’s online actions. It also includes skills for handling privacy and security in online environments. These activities fall into two main categories: digital citizenship and collaboration.

Digital citizenship refers to one’s ability to interact effectively in the digital world. Part of this skill is good manners, often referred to as “netiquette.” There is a level of context which is often missing in digital communication due to physical distance, lack of personal familiarity with the people online, and the sheer volume of the people who may encounter our words. People who know us well may understand exactly what we mean when we say something sarcastic or ironic, but people online do not know us, and vocal and facial cues are missing in most digital communication, making it more likely we will be misunderstood. Furthermore, we are more likely to misunderstand or be misunderstood if we are unaware of cultural differences. So, digital citizenship includes an awareness of who we are, what we intend to say, and how it might be perceived by other people we do not know (Buckingham, 2006). It is also a process of learning to communicate clearly in ways that help others understand what we mean.

Another key digital skill is collaboration, and it is essential for effective participation in digital projects via the Internet. The Internet allows people to engage with others they may never see in person and work towards common goals, be they social, civic, or business oriented. Creating a community and working together requires a degree of trust and familiarity that can be difficult to build when there is physical distance between the participants. Greater effort must be made to be inclusive , and to overcome perceived or actual distance and disconnectedness. So, while the potential of digital technology for connecting people is impressive, it is not automatic or effortless, and it requires new skills.

Literacy narratives are stories about reading or composing a message in any form or context. They often include poignant memories that involve a personal experience with literacy. Digital literacy narratives can sometimes be categorized as ones that focus on how the writer came to understand the importance of technology in their life or pedagogy. More often, they are simply narratives that use a medium beyond the print-based essay to tell the story:

Create your own literacy narrative that tells of a significant experience you had with digital literacy. Use a multi-modal tool that includes audio and images or video. Share it with your classmates and discuss the most important ideas you notice in each other’s narratives.

Critical literacy

Literacy scholars recognize that although literacy is a cognitive skill, it is also a set of practices that communities and people participate in. Next, we turn to another perspective on literacy – critical literacy. “Critical” here is not meant as having a negative point of view, but rather using an analytic lens that detects power, privilege, and representation to understand different ways of looking at texts. For example, when groups or individuals stage a protest, do the media refer to them as “protesters” or “rioters?” What is the reason for choosing the label they do, and what are the consequences? 

Critical literacy does not have a set definition or typical history of use, but the following key tenets have been described in the literature, which will vary in their application based on the individual social context (Vasquez, 2019). Table 1 presents some key aspects of critical literacy, but this area of literacy research is growing and evolving rapidly, so this is not an exhaustive list.

An important component of critical literacy is the adoption of culturally responsive and sustaining pedagogy. One definition comes from Dr. Django Paris (2012), who stated that Culturally Responsive-Sustaining (CR-S) education recognizes that cultural differences (including racial, ethnic, linguistic, gender, sexuality, and ability ones) should be treated as assets for teaching and learning. Culturally sustaining pedagogy requires teachers to support multilingualism and multiculturalism in their practice. That is, culturally sustaining pedagogy seeks to perpetuate and foster—to sustain—linguistic, literary, and cultural pluralism as part of the democratic project of schooling.

For more, see the Culturally Responsive and Sustaining F ramework . The framework helps educators to think about how to create student-centered learning environments that uphold racial, linguistic, and cultural identities. It prepares students for rigorous independent learning, develops their abilities to connect across lines of difference, elevates historically marginalized voices, and empowers them as agents of social change. CR-S education explores the relationships between historical and contemporary conditions of inequality and the ideas that shape access, participation, and outcomes for learners.

• What can you do to learn more about your students’ cultures?
• How can you build and sustain relationships with your students?
• How do the instructional materials you use affirm your students’ identities?

Community-based literacies

You may have noticed that communities are a big part of critical literacy – we understand that our environment and culture impact what we read and how we understand the world. Now think about the possible differences among three Iowa communities: a neighborhood in the middle of Des Moines, the rural community of New Hartford, and Coralville, a suburb of Iowa City:

You may not have thought about how living in a certain community might contribute to or take away from a child’s ability to learn to read. Dr. Susan Neuman (2001) did. She and her team investigated the differences between two neighborhoods regarding how much access to books and other reading materials children in those neighborhoods had. One middle-to-upper class neighborhood in Philadelphia had large bookstores, toy stores with educational materials, and well-resourced libraries. The other, a low-income neighborhood, had no bookstores or toy stores. There was a library, but it had fewer resources and served a larger number of patrons. In fact, the team found that even the signs on the businesses were harder to read, and there was less environmental printed word. Their findings showed that each child in the middle-class neighborhood had 13 books on average, while in the lower-class neighborhood there was one book per 300 children .

Dr. Neuman and her team (2019) recently revisited this question. This time, they looked at low-income neighborhoods – those where 60% or more of the people are living in poverty . They compared these to borderline neighborhoods – those with 20-40% in poverty – in three cities, Washington, D.C., Detroit, and Los Angeles. Again, they found significantly fewer books in the very low-income areas. The chart represents the preschool books available for sale in each neighborhood. Note that in the lower-income neighborhood of Washington D.C., there were no books for young children to be found at all!

Now watch this video from Campaign for Grade Level Reading. Access to books is one way that children can have new experiences, but it is not the only way!

What is the “summer slide,” and how does it contribute to the differences in children’s reading abilities?

The importance of being literate and how to get there

“Literacy is a bridge from misery to hope” – Kofi Annan, former United Nations Secretary-General.

Our economy is enhanced when citizens have higher literacy levels. Effective literacy skills open the doors to more educational and employment opportunities so that people can lift themselves out of poverty and chronic underemployment. In our increasingly complex and rapidly changing technological world, it is essential that individuals continuously expand their knowledge and learn new skills to keep up with the pace of change. The goal of our public school system in the United States is to “ensure that all students graduate from high school with the skills and knowledge necessary to succeed in college, career, and life, regardless of where they live.” This is the basis of the Common Core Standards, developed by the Council of Chief State School Officers (CCSSO) and the National Governors Association Center for Best Practices (NGA Center). These groups felt that education was too inconsistent across the different states, and today’s students are preparing to enter a world in which colleges and businesses are demanding more than ever before. To ensure that all students are ready for success after high school, the Common Core State Standards established clear universal guidelines for what every student should know and be able to do in math and English language arts from kindergarten through 12th grade: “The Common Core State Standards do not tell teachers how to teach, but they do help teachers figure out the knowledge and skills their students should have” (Common Core State Standards Initiative, 2012).

Explore the Core!

Go to iowacore.gov and click on Literacy Standards. Spend some time looking at the K-3 standards. Notice how consistent they are across the grade levels. Each has specific requirements within the categories:

• Reading Standards for Literature
• Reading Standards for Informational Text
• Reading Standards for Foundational Skills
• Writing Standards
• Speaking and Listening Standards
• Language Standards

Download the Iowa Core K-12 Literacy Manual . You will use it as a reference when you are creating lessons.

Next, explore the Subject Area pages and resources. What tools does the state provide to teachers to support their use of the Core?

Describe a resource you found on the website. How will you use this when you are a teacher?

Watch this video about the Iowa Literacy Core Standards:

• Literacy is typically defined as the ability to ingest, understand, and communicate information.
• Literacy has multiple definitions, each with a different point of focus.
• “New literacies,” or multiliteracies, are a combination of multiple ways of communicating and making meaning, including visual, audio, spatial, behavioral, and gestural communication.
• As online communication has become more prevalent, digital literacy has become more important for learners to engage with the wealth of information available online.
• Critical literacy develops learners’ critical thinking by asking them to use an analytic lens that detects power, privilege, and representation to understand different ways of looking at information.
• The Common Core State Standards were established to set clear, universal guidelines for what every student should know after completing high school.

Resources for teacher educators

• Culturally Responsive-Sustaining Education Framework [PDF]
• Common Core State Standards
• Iowa Core Instructional Resources in Literacy

Gonzalez, N., Moll, L. C., & Amanti, C. (Eds.). (2006). Funds of knowledge: Theorizing practices in households, communities, and classrooms . New York, NY: Routledge.

Lau, S. M. C. (2012). Reconceptualizing critical literacy teaching in ESL classrooms. The Reading Teacher, 65 , 325–329.

Literacy. (2018, March 19). Retrieved March 2, 2020, from  https://en.unesco.org/themes/literacy

Neuman, S. B., & Celano, D. (2001). Access to print in low‐income and middle‐income communities: An ecological study of four neighborhoods. Reading Research Quarterly, 36 (1), 8-26.

Neuman, S. B., & Moland, N. (2019). Book deserts: The consequences of income segregation on children’s access to print.  Urban education, 54 (1), 126-147.

New London Group (1996). A Pedagogy of multiliteracies: Designing social futures.  Harvard Educational Review, 66 (1), 60-92.

O’Brien, J. (2001). Children reading critically: A local history. In B. Comber & A. Simpson (Eds.), Negotiating critical literacies in classrooms (pp. 41–60). Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.

Ordoñez-Jasis, R., & Ortiz, R. W. (2006). Reading their worlds: Working with diverse families to enhance children’s early literacy development. Y C Young Children, 61 (1), 42.

Saha S. (2006). Improving literacy as a means to reducing health disparities. J Gen Intern Med. 21 (8):893-895. doi:10.1111/j.1525-1497.2006.00546.x

UNESCO. (2017). Literacy rates continue to rise from one generation to the next global literacy trends today. Retrieved from http://on.unesco.org/literacy-map.

Vasquez, V.M., Janks, H. & Comber, B. (2019). Critical Literacy as a Way of Being and Doing. Language Arts, 96 (5), 300-311.

Vlieghe, J. (2015). Traditional and digital literacy. The literacy hypothesis, technologies of reading and writing, and the ‘grammatized’ body. Ethics and Education, 10 (2), 209-226.

Zimmerman, E. B., Woolf, S. H., Blackburn, S. M., Kimmel, A. D., Barnes, A. J., & Bono, R. S. (2018). The case for considering education and health. Urban Education, 53 (6), 744-773.U.S. Department of Education. Institute of Education Sciences.

U.S. Department of Education. Institute of Education Sciences, National Center for Education Statistics, National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), 2022 Reading Assessment.

Methods of Teaching Early Literacy Copyright © 2023 by Constance Beecher is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License , except where otherwise noted.

Families reading at home is just one way a culture of reading is growing in Rwanda.

Why Does Literacy Matter?

Is anything more powerful than the ability to read and to write? Through written language, we convey beliefs, record knowledge, and explore our common humanity. Alphabets may be different around the world, but literacy—that core ability to make sense of the written word—is cherished across all cultures and traditions.

On this International Literacy Day (September 8), five EDC staff members reflect on why literacy matters. Follow us on Twitter and Facebook for more about literacy and International Literacy Day.

The greatest gift

Simon Richmond

"Creating the concept and system of reading is one of humankind’s greatest intellectual achievements. Reading and writing magnify our capacity to learn, which is the competitive advantage of our species and the very foundation of human civilization. When a child learns to read, she unlocks and accelerates an expanding process of re-forming her self-identity and of enacting her will within the world. What more can you give her? To read is to better understand, and to understand is the greatest gift of being human."

Unlocking the world’s secrets

Jackie Bourassa

"Sharing thoughts, ideas, and emotions is key to the human experience. Developing literacy skills facilitates effective communication. Over a lifetime, children hone their skills to read, write, speak, listen, think, and respond critically—skills that unlock the world’s secrets and provide unlimited possibilities. Literacy matters because of the endless doors it opens!"

After students in the Philippines learn how to read, they begin to read to learn.

The right of literacy

Life-changing experiences.

Bill Potter

"Strong literacy skills serve as foundational building blocks for positive social development. I’ve seen this pattern repeated all over the world. Literate mothers are better able to support their families’ health, and literate children and adults develop empathy through the stories they read. Empathy leads to social awareness and fosters more supportive communities.

"Unfortunately, too many children around the world are still not afforded the life-changing experience of learning how to read and write. We owe them this right of literacy and must continue our efforts to make reading a part of their lives."

A true expression of humanity

Nancy Clark-Chiarelli

"Natalie Babbitt, the acclaimed children’s author, once remarked, ‘It’s amazing that those 26 little marks of the alphabet can arrange themselves on the pages of a book and accomplish all that.’

"It’s true; the alphabet is a wonder. But it is also just a tool. It takes a skilled teacher to help any learner decipher those little squiggles so that they are transformed into words and ideas, into stories and songs. What we do with that knowledge, that literacy, is a true expression of humanity."

A community of learning

Carrie Lewis

"Literacy matters because it brings students into a life-long community of learning that links people across borders. Literacy matters because it engage citizens in meaningful ways to participate in building a society and government of their choosing. Literacy matters because in a world with a widening gap between connected and unconnected, reading and writing and its partner, critical thinking, allow young and old to engage on equal footing."

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Improving our Community, Our Economy, and Individual Lives

Literacy and English language proficiency are tools that help people move out of poverty and get better-paying jobs to support their families. Literacy allows parents to read to their children. Improved literacy skills benefit not only the struggling reader, but everyone in our community regardless of age, race, gender, or background.

(The following text is from the ProLiteracy website, October 2009.)

Adults need strong literacy skills…

…to raise children who have strong literacy skills. Learning to read begins long before a child enters school. It begins when parents read to their children, buy their children books, and encourage their children to read. The research is clear: parents who are poor readers don’t read as often to their children as do parents who are strong readers.   These children [of low-literate parents] enter school less prepared to learn to read than other children.

A mother’s reading level is the single greatest determinant in her child’s academic success (proliteracy.org).

…to be good employees. The employees most in demand in the U.S. have at least a two-year college degree. Workers must be able to read safety regulations and warnings so they and their co-workers can stay safe on the job. And working in a team means that employees must be able to communicate clearly with one another.

…to keep themselves and their families healthy. Understanding a doctor’s orders, calculating how much medicine to take, reading disease-prevention pamphlets—all are ways adults can keep themselves and their families healthy. But millions of adults lack these essential “health literacy” skills, which adds an estimated $230 billion a year to the cost of health care in the U.S.

…to avoid crime. There is a clear correlation between adult illiteracy and crime. More than 75 percent in state facilities, and 59 percent in federal corrections institutions did not graduate from high school or can be classified as low-literate.

…to be active in their communities. Political campaigns in the U.S. often stress the need for “informed voters.” But how can an individual be well informed if he or she cannot access written campaign literature or read newspaper coverage of the issues and candidates? The 2003 National Assessment of Adult Literacy, conducted by the U.S. Department of Education, showed that low literate adults are less likely to vote than strong readers, but become more active in their communities as their reading and writing skills improve.

…to advocate for themselves and avoid human rights abuse. People must be aware of their rights in order to assert them. Literacy gives people access to that information. Literacy plays a significant role in reducing gender, race, nationality, and religious inequality that favors one group over another in access to education, property, employment, health care, legal, and civic participation.

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Literacy: Why it matters

• Curriculum integration
• English COMING SOON
• Health, PE & relationships
• Literacy (primary level)
•   Practice: early literacy
• Literacy (secondary level)
• Mathematics
• Social sciences COMING SOON

Diverse learners

• Gifted and talented
• Neurodiversity
• Speech and language differences
• Trauma-informed practice
• Executive function
• Movement and learning 
• Science of learning
• Self-efficacy
• Self-regulation
• Social connection
• Social-emotional learning
• Principles of assessment
• Assessment for learning
• Measuring progress
• Self-assessment

Instruction and pedagogy

• Classroom management
• Culturally responsive pedagogy
• Co-operative learning
• High-expectation teaching
• Philosophical approaches
• Planning and instructional design
• Questioning

Relationships

• Home-school partnerships
• Student wellbeing NEW
• Transitions

Teacher development

• Instructional coaching
• Professional learning communities
• Teacher inquiry
• Teacher wellbeing
• Instructional leadership
• Strategic leadership

Learning environments

• Flexible spaces
• Neurodiversity in Primary Schools
• Neurodiversity in Secondary Schools

There are few skills more important to acquire in today’s world than literacy. Literacy is a gateway to academic achievement and a significant influence on outcomes as diverse as earning potential and health and wellbeing. High levels of literacy across society are vital to happy, healthy and fulfilling lives [1] . However, despite the undeniable importance of literacy, literacy levels have been flatlining or in decline in many countries across the world, especially in a number of western nations.

This research summary outlines the benefits of literacy for both education and broader life outcomes. Literacy here is conceptualised as the ability to read and write proficiently. Using this definition does not negate the significant role that other modes of literacy, including oracy and listening skills, have on individuals’ life outcomes. It also recognises that each of these modes of literacy is interrelated – for example, early oral language skills are known to strongly predict later reading comprehension [2] . However, given that the vast majority of research studies that inquire into the importance of literacy define it in terms of reading and writing, it is practical for this brief summary to take reading and writing as its focus. 

Literacy and educational success

Literacy is essential for educational success and underpins a student’s ability to access the breadth of the curriculum and achieve highly across it. Children who lack adequate levels of literacy risk experiencing a narrowed curriculum, ongoing difficulties with self-expression and limited future pathways.

From the start of formal schooling, students who struggle with literacy will seriously struggle both to access written material used in classrooms and to express themselves in tasks that involve writing. Subject areas like English and the social sciences are extremely dependent on student literacy, as the vast majority of learning tasks within these areas require substantial amounts of reading and writing, even in the early years of schooling [3] . If students have low reading levels, they will be unable to properly process the complex texts required to succeed in these subject areas. For instance, they will find it difficult to make inferences and to summarise information they read, which will significantly limit their ability to build the knowledge and understanding they need for future success [4] . Similarly, students with insufficient writing skills will struggle to express themselves with the level of competence and sophistication required to succeed in these subjects. The converse is also true, and research has consistently shown that so-called ‘writing-to-learn’ interventions, where writing is embedded into instruction as a way of deepening student understanding of content, lead to improved academic achievement in these subjects, especially if such interventions are sustained throughout a student’s years at school [5] .

Literacy is just as important for students to access the curriculum and achieve academic success in subjects not traditionally associated with literacy. Research has shown that literacy is crucial for mathematics and science achievement, especially as these subjects move to focus more on ‘real-world’ problem-solving tasks which require students to engage with complex texts [6] . We also know that literacy-based interventions focused on improving reading are an important way to improve student outcomes in these subjects [7] . While less is understood about the relationship between writing ability and achievement in subjects like science and mathematics, some research has shown that students’ ability to express themselves clearly and accurately in writing is central to doing well in these subjects [8] . It is also the case that, as with reading-based interventions, interventions in science and mathematics classrooms that support students to become better writers, such as the ‘writing-to-learn’ style interventions above, support their achievement in these subjects [9] .

Finally, research indicates that there is a significant relationship between literacy and what is typically termed ‘fluid intelligence’, that is, the ability to reason efficiently and critically, particularly in the context of solving novel problems [10] . It is difficult to define the direction of this relationship with a great degree of precision, but it is likely bidirectional, which means that fluid intelligence supports literacy development and also that gains in literacy may support gains in fluid intelligence. Therefore, in addition to providing students with opportunities to learn and supporting success across the curriculum, literacy likely also supports the development of general cognitive skill [11] .  However, this is still an emerging area of scholarly inquiry.

Taken together, the above evidence makes the importance of literacy for educational success clear. It is essential to ensure that students are highly literate if we want them to be able to access the full breadth of the curriculum and reach their full potential within the education system.

Literacy and broader life outcomes

Beyond formal education, literacy is an important factor when it comes to a range of life outcomes, from income levels to improved happiness and health.

Literacy and income

A range of studies have shown that improved literacy levels directly correlate to improved income levels for individuals. For instance, the OECD’s Programme for the International Assessment of Adult Competencies (PIAAC) study found that moving from the lowest levels of literacy to the highest levels of literacy (as measured by their scale-based system) resulted in an 8-10% increase in hourly earnings for those with an upper secondary education, and a 15-18% increase for those with a tertiary level education. This was the case even when controlling for a range of factors such as age, gender, and parental education levels [12] . A similar study from the United Kingdom found that, even when controlling for factors as diverse as an individual’s socio-economic status, the school they attended, parental involvement in their education and so on, those with what they called ‘functional literacy’ (a reading age of 11 or above) were able to earn on average 16% more than those with lower levels of literacy [13] . The data for New Zealand mirrors these international trends, with higher literacy levels directly correlating with higher earning potential [14] .

Literacy and health

The links between literacy and health outcomes are many and varied. A number of studies show strong correlations between literacy and general health outcomes, and demonstrate that more literate individuals enjoy better health and live longer [15] . Even when controlling for other potential factors which could explain health outcomes like age, gender, socio-economic status, income, ethnicity and so on, lower literacy has been consistently associated with outcomes as diverse as more hospitalisations, lower vaccine uptake, lower participation in screening programmes (such as those for certain forms of cancer) and increased recourse to emergency care [16] . In particular, a number of studies looking at the relationship between literacy and health have focused on individuals’ ability to engage with the complex texts necessary to navigate health systems, self-administer prescription drugs correctly, and follow public health guidelines and general advice. Put simply, looking after your health often requires reading and comprehending a significant amount of complex information, and studies have shown that patients who struggle with understanding this information – such as the instructions on prescriptions or information forms provided by health services – will suffer poorer health outcomes as a result [17] . To summarise, a more literate population is also a significantly healthier population with a longer life expectancy.

Literacy and crime

As with income and health, a range of factors in a person’s life course clearly influence whether or not they end up within the criminal justice system. However, research has shown that literacy levels remain a predictor of criminal activity, even when controlling for other key factors typically associated with an individual’s likelihood of committing a crime [18] . The UK-based National Literacy Trust surmises that this is likely to be because issues with literacy may compound other already extant risk-factors, further limiting a person’s life chances in ways which can ultimately, if indirectly, lead to criminal activity [19] . While it is important to be careful in claiming any direct causal link between literacy levels and rates of offending, literacy may be considered as one of a broad range of factors involved in understanding why someone may end up committing an offence.

Literacy, identity, and wellbeing

In addition to mediating some of the life outcomes explored above, literacy is also an important bedrock for identity, something which can have a number of positive flow-on effects for individuals and their communities. This is particularly the case where individuals and communities are able to gain or regain literacy in their heritage language(s). In Aotearoa New Zealand, Māori who have developed literacy in te reo Māori (the Māori language), including both oral literacy and skills in reading and writing, have been shown to have stronger cultural identities and greater overall wellbeing [20] . Strengthened literacy in heritage languages also means that individuals find it easier to engage in particular cultural spaces where these heritage languages are predominant. This improved sense of cultural identity has positive effects on mental health in particular [21] . Beyond cultural identity, literacy also supports the development of self-understanding, the understanding of others and self-expression through reading and writing, all of which can positively affect mental health more broadly [22] .

[1] Morrisroe, J. (2014). Literacy changes lives 2014: A new perspective on health, employment and crime . National Literacy Trust.

[2] Kendeou, P., van den Broek, P., White, M. J., & Lynch, J. S. (2009). Predicting reading comprehension in early elementary school: The independent contributions of oral language and decoding skills.  Journal of Educational Psychology, 101 (4), 765–778.  https://doi.org/10.1037/a0015956

[3] Lee, C. D., & Spratley, A. (2010). Reading in the disciplines: The challenges of adolescent literacy. Final report from Carnegie Corporation of New York’s Council on Advancing Adolescent Literacy.  Carnegie Corporation of New York.

[4] Denton, C. A., Enos, M., York, M. J., Francis, D. J., Barnes, M. A., Kulesz, P. A., … & Carter, S. (2015). Text‐processing differences in adolescent adequate and poor comprehenders reading accessible and challenging narrative and informational text.  Reading Research Quarterly ,  50 (4), 393-416.

[5] Bangert-Drowns, R. L., Hurley, M. M., & Wilkinson, B. (2004). The effects of school-based writing-to-learn interventions on academic achievement: A meta-analysis.  Review of Educational Research ,  74 (1), 29-58; Graham, S., Kiuhara, S. A., & MacKay, M. (2020). The effects of writing on learning in science, social studies, and mathematics: A meta-analysis.  Review of Educational Research ,  90 (2), 179-226.

[6] Dempster, E. R., & Reddy, V. (2007). Item readability and science achievement in TIMSS 2003 in South Africa. Science Education , 91 (6), 906-925; Helwig, R., Rozek-Tedesco, M. A., Tindal, G., Heath, B., & Almond, P. J. (1999). Reading as an access to mathematics problem solving on multiple-choice tests for sixth-grade students. The Journal of Educational Research , 93 (2), 113-125; Jiban, C. L., & Deno, S. L. (2007). Using math and reading curriculum-based measurements to predict state mathematics test performance: are simple one-minute measures technically adequate?. Assessment for Effective Intervention , 32 (2), 78-89; O’Reilly, T., & McNamara, D. S. (2007). The impact of science knowledge, reading skill, and reading strategy knowledge on more traditional “high-stakes” measures of high school students’ science achievement. American Educational Research Journal , 44 (1), 161-196.     

[7] Cervetti, G. N., Barber, J., Dorph, R., Pearson, P. D., & Goldschmidt, P. G. (2012). The impact of an integrated approach to science and literacy in elementary school classrooms. Journal of Research in Science Teaching , 49 (5), 631-658; Fang, Z., & Wei, Y. (2010). Improving middle school students’ science literacy through reading infusion. The Journal of Educational Research , 103 (4), 262-273; Tong, F., Irby, B. J., Lara-Alecio, R., & Koch, J. (2014). Integrating literacy and science for English language learners: From learning-to-read to reading-to-learn. The Journal of Educational Research , 107 (5), 410-426.

[8] Hebert, M. A., & Powell, S. R. (2016). Examining fourth-grade mathematics writing: Features of organization, mathematics vocabulary, and mathematical representations. Reading and Writing , 29 (7), 1511-1537; Powell, S. R., & Hebert, M. A. (2016). Influence of writing ability and computation skill on mathematics writing. The Elementary School Journal , 117 (2), 310-335.

[9] Cross, D. I. (2009). Creating optimal mathematics learning environments: Combining argumentation and writing to enhance achievement. International Journal of Science and Mathematics Education , 7 (5), 905-930; Jurdak, M., & Abu Zein, R. (1998). The effect of journal writing on achievement in and attitudes toward mathematics. School Science and Mathematics , 98 (8), 412-419; Miller, D. M., Scott, C. E., & McTigue, E. M. (2018). Writing in the secondary-level disciplines: A systematic review of context, cognition, and content. Educational Psychology Review , 30 (1), 83-120); Graham, S., Kiuhara, S. A., & MacKay, M. (2020). The effects of writing on learning in science, social studies, and mathematics: A meta-analysis.  Review of Educational Research ,  90 (2), 179-226.

[10] Peng, P., Wang, T., Wang, C., & Lin, X. (2019). A meta-analysis on the relation between fluid intelligence and reading/mathematics: Effects of tasks, age, and social economics status.  Psychological Bulletin ,  145 (2), 189.

[11] Miller-Cotto, D., & Byrnes, J. P. (2020). What’s the best way to characterize the relationship between working memory and achievement?: An initial examination of competing theories.  Journal of Educational Psychology ,  112 (5), 1074; Peng, P., & Kievit, R. A. (2020). The development of academic achievement and cognitive abilities: A bidirectional perspective.  Child Development Perspectives ,  14 (1), 15-20.

[12] Lane, M., & Conlon, G. (2016). The impact of literacy, numeracy and computer skills on earnings and employment outcomes.  OECD Education Working Papers , No. 129, OECD Publishing, Paris,  https://doi.org/10.1787/5jm2cv4t4gzs-en .

[13] McIntosh, S., & Vignoles, A. (2001). Micro-analysis of the effects of literacy and numeracy. In Bynner et al. (Eds), Improving adult basic skills: Benefits to the individual and to society . London: Centre for Longitudinal Studies.

[14] OECD. (2015). PIAAC Country Note: New Zealand . Accessed at: https://www.oecd.org/skills/piaac/Skills-Matter-New-Zealand.pdf

[15] Bostock, S., & Steptoe, A. (2012). Association between low functional health literacy and mortality in older adults: Longitudinal cohort study.  BMJ ,  344 .

[16] Berkman, N. D., Sheridan, S. L., Donahue, K. E., Halpern, D. J., & Crotty, K. (2011). Low health literacy and health outcomes: An updated systematic review.  Annals of Internal Medicine ,  155 (2), 97-107.

[17] For a general overview see: Berkman, N. D., Sheridan, S. L., Donahue, K. E., Halpern, D. J., & Crotty, K. (2011). Low health literacy and health outcomes: An updated systematic review.  Annals of Internal Medicine ,  155 (2), 97-107. Specific studies include: Wagner, C., Semmler, C., Good, A., & Wardle, J. (2009). Health literacy and self-efficacy for participating in colorectal cancer screening: The role of information processing. Patient Education and Counseling, 75 (3), 52-7;  Davis, T. C., Wolf, M.S., Bass III, P. F., Thompson, J. A., Tilson, H. H., Neuberger, M., et al. (2006). Literacy and misunderstanding prescription drug labels. Annals of Internal Medicine , 145 (12), 887-894; Schillinger D., Barton, L. R., Karter, A.J., Wang, F., & Adler, N. (2006). Does literacy mediate the relationship between education and health outcomes? A study of a low-income population with diabetes. Public Health Reports , 121(3), 245-254. doi:10.1177/003335490612100305

[18] Bynner, J. (2009).  Lifelong learning and crime: A life-course perspective . National Institute of Adult and Continuing Education (NIACE); Parsons, S. (2002).  Basic skills and crime: Findings from a study of adults born in 1958 and 1970 . Basic Skills Agency.

[19] Morrisroe, J. (2014). Literacy changes lives 2014: A new perspective on health, employment and crime.  National Literacy Trust .

[20] Te Huia, A. (2015). Perspectives towards Māori identity by Māori heritage language learners. New Zealand Journal of Psychology , 44 (3); Matika, C. M., Manuela, S., Houkamau, C. A., & Sibley, C. G. (2021). Māori and Pasifika language, identity, and wellbeing in Aotearoa New Zealand. Kōtuitui: New Zealand Journal of Social Sciences Online , 1-23.

[21] Williams, A. D., Clark, T. C., & Lewycka, S. (2018). The associations between cultural identity and mental health outcomes for indigenous Māori youth in New Zealand. Frontiers in Public Health , 6 , 319.

[22] Mar, R. A., & Oatley, K. (2008). The function of fiction is the abstraction and simulation of social experience.  Perspectives on Psychological Science ,  3 (3), 173-192; Smyth, J. M. (1998). Written emotional expression: Effect sizes, outcome types, and moderating variables.  Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology ,  66 (1), 174.

By Taylor Hughson

PREPARED FOR THE EDUCATION HUB BY

Taylor Hughson

Taylor Hughson is a doctoral researcher at the University of Cambridge, investigating the development of national and international teaching policy frameworks. Prior to beginning his studies in Cambridge, he completed an MEd and MA at Victoria University of Wellington and was a secondary school English teacher in Auckland and Wellington, New Zealand. 

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What is Literacy and Why is it Important?

What is literacy?

Literacy is most commonly defined as the ability to read and write.

But it’s not as simple as it sounds. Reading and writing abilities vary across different cultures and contexts, and these too are constantly shifting.

Nowadays, ‘reading’ encompasses complex visual and digital media as well as printed material. An elderly person who can read the newspaper might struggle to get information from Google.

Similarly, different cultures will have different perceptions of literacy. The writing traditions of the English language make reading comprehension an essential part of literacy, but this might not be as important in cultures or groups that rarely read printed material.

Why is literacy important?

Students need literacy in order to engage with the written word in everyday life.

Think of how often you use your own reading skills in everyday life. It’s not just articles like this one that require literacy, but signs, labels, and the messages on your phone, too.

The same goes for writing. Nowadays, even phone calls have given way to instant messaging and text-based communication, making the ability to read all the more important.

But beyond the functional level, literacy plays a vital role in transforming students into socially engaged citizens. Being able to read and write means being able to keep up with current events, communicate effectively, and understand the issues that are shaping our world.

Ways to support literacy development

Literacy development should be a combined effort between home and school. Here are a few things you can do to support early learners’ literacy skills:

Encourage reading

Reading is the first pillar of literacy, so encourage young learners to immerse themselves in it frequently and deeply. This should involve exposure to a broad variety of different genres, such as newspapers, novels, comics, magazines, films, reference material, and websites.

Discuss texts together

Actively discussing what has been read encourages learners to make connections and think deeply about the ideas contained in texts. Follow up the reading or viewing of a text with a discussion of what it made learners think and feel.

Use games and activities that support literacy development

• Write a half-page story that makes use of a new and unusual word or phrase.
• Describe a person or object with as many adjectives as you can think of.
• Information scavenger hunt: scour the web to find facts on a given topic within a set time frame.
• Recap the plot of a novel or film in your own words (as learners progress they can try to do this in as few words as possible).
• Have a competition to see who can find as many rhyming words as possible, starting from a given word. Learners could also write poems or songs with rhyme.

Make use of the library

Immersing children in a huge range of texts encourages them to dive in and explore. There’s no better place to do this than the school or community library.

Find a huge selection of printable literacy resources

You might like....

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How Important Is Teaching Literacy in All Content Areas?

Students do plenty of listening in our classes, but what about reading, writing, and speaking?

You’re busy this summer planning and reworking lessons—adding, adjusting, and tweaking. Fast-forward to fall: We know students do plenty of listening in our classes, but what about the other three communication skills they should be engaging in and practicing daily? I’m talking about reading, writing, and speaking.

Let’s define literacy. It was once known simply as the ability to read and write. Today it’s about being able to make sense of and engage in advanced reading, writing, listening, and speaking. Someone who has reached advanced literacy in a new language, for example, is able to engage in these four skills with their new language in any setting.

Literacy Is an Every-Century Skill

If you are a math, history, science, or art teacher, where does literacy fit into your instruction? It’s common to believe that literacy instruction is solely the charge of language arts teachers, but, frankly, this just is not so. As Richard Vaca, author of Content Area Reading: Literacy and Learning Across the Curriculum , says, “Adolescents entering the adult world in the 21st century will read and write more than at any other time in human history. They will need advanced levels of literacy to perform their jobs, run their households, act as citizens, and conduct their personal lives.”

With content standards looming, it’s easy to focus only on the content we teach. We have so much to tell students and share with them. However, are we affording students enough time daily to practice crucial communication skills?

Here’s one way to look at it: Content is what we teach, but there is also the how, and this is where literacy instruction comes in. There are an endless number of engaging, effective strategies to get students to think about, write about, read about, and talk about the content you teach. The ultimate goal of literacy instruction is to build a student’s comprehension, writing skills, and overall skills in communication.

Ask yourself, how do I mostly convey the information and knowledge to my students? Do I turn primarily to straight lecture or teacher talk? Or do I allow multiple opportunities for students to discover information on their own?

Academic or high-level conversations in small and large group settings do not just happen. It takes time—and scaffolding—to create a Socratic seminar setting in your classroom.

In order for our students to engage in academic conversation, or accountable talk, they need plenty of practice with informal conversation in pairs and triads. Use the following strategies frequently for building students’ oral skills: think-pair-share, elbow partner, shoulder share, and chunk and chew . Kids need to be talking and not sitting passively in their seats. Remember, Lev Vygotsky believed learning to be a very social act.

For every five to eight minutes that you talk, give students one to two minutes to talk to each other. You can walk around and listen, informally assessing and checking for understanding.

Conversation helps immensely when we’re processing new content and concepts. Students also will surely have more fruitful answers to share. (And be sure to always provide think time when asking questions of students.)

When was the last time your students had sore hands from writing in your class? Just like conversation, writing helps us make sense of what we are learning and helps us make connections to our own lives or others’ ideas. You can’t avoid thinking when you write.

Students need to be writing every day, in every classroom. How about adding to your instruction more informal and fun writing activities like quick writes, stop and jots, one-minute essays, or  graffiti conversations ? Not all writing assignments need be formal ones.

If you haven’t heard of the National Writing Project (NWP), it’s the largest-scale and longest-standing teacher development program in U.S. history. Workshops are offered nationwide (usually through a local university); teachers of all content areas learn new and exciting strategies to encourage, support, and grow the young writers in their classrooms.

Two tenets of the NWP that I think produce wide gains in student writing: teachers writing side-by-side with students, and creating time on a regular basis in your classroom for writer’s workshop that follows a type of writing process that puts the writer in charge (of content, voice, and structure).

The days of believing that we could hand informational text or a novel to a student and assume they make full meaning of it on their own are gone. Whether we like it or not, regardless of the content we teach, we are all reading instructors.

Scaffolding the reading by using effective strategies for before, during, and after reading—such as  previewing text , reading for a purpose, making predictions and connections, think alouds , and using graphic organizers—will support all our students, not just struggling readers and English learners.

We need to inspire a love for reading, and build reading stamina in our students, which means eyes and mind on the page for more than a minute. How do we do this? A high-interest classroom library is a great place to start. If you are a Title I school, there should be funds set aside for classroom libraries. If not, advocate for all classrooms at your school site to have a library, even if it’s just a handful of books to get you going.

You can make the investment yourself, or have a book-raiser party. Email all your friends a wish list for books that students have requested and recurring favorites (e.g.,  Twilight, Guinness Book of World Records ). Ask your friends to bring one or two of the books to your cocktail party. (Read this Edutopia post for ideas on how to set up and manage your classroom library).

If you are a physics teacher, do all your books need to be about science? Absolutely not! But you might want to focus primarily on informational, nonfiction books. In fact, with the new national standards for English emphasizing more nonfiction text and quite a bit less literature, all K–12 teachers need to enhance their libraries with more nonfiction, which can include newspaper and magazine subscriptions.

I’m not going to go into listening here, since I think our students do plenty of that already, but here’s a great website with characteristics of an effective listener you can share with your students and they can practice with each other.

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A Critical Resource: The Importance of Literacy Skills

Learn about the importance of literacy skills. This article explores how improved reading and writing abilities lead to student success and prepare learners for the challenges of the 21st-century job market.

Published on May 21, 2024

Literacy as a key to the future

As work in every job sector requires research, analysis, and effective communication, literacy skills have become indispensable tools for success.

 The ability to read, write and comprehend information not only forms the foundation for academic achievement, but it also plays a significant role in shaping students’ future careers. According to Paul Deane, Principal Research Scientist at ETS, “To succeed in the twenty-first century economy, you have to have [literacy] skills that only a small percentage of the population may have needed in the 1920s.” 

Many schools emphasize reading catch-up alongside basic writing skills: grammar, structure, and mechanics. While these skills are certainly important, educators must prepare for advanced writing matters , including intensive workshopping and revising , should students want to claim greater fluency over their literacy abilities. “Schools with better prepared kids,” notes Paul Deane, “can spend more time in writing and cover more ground in writing …When you do that, you get faster skill growth and more motivated kids.” Supporting this kind of well-structured and meaningful content, in turn, has a powerful impact on a student’s future , or, as Deane puts it, “If you can’t write a good admissions essay, you’re already behind the 8-ball.”

An urgent need for literacy skills

Reading scores have remained stagnant for the past two decades - in recent years, they have declined due to the pandemic .

Information like this, which was revealed by the Nation’s Report Card by the National Assessment of Educational Progress , makes the case that to perform in today's competitive job market, students must possess proficient literacy skills . Travis Park, Associate Professor of Agricultural Education at North Carolina State University in Raleigh, wonders, “ Are we creating students who can be lifelong learners, not just the oil changers and mechanics, but the managers, the owners of the business? ” His question emphasizes the urgent need for schools to address literacy skills before the job market demands them later : “If you’re in it for that game,” Park says, “then reading is vitally important for [students’] long-term success.” 

To address the challenges of improving literacy skills, many schools are turning to tech-based solutions . The right technology can offer immediate auto-grading and diagnostic reviews. As such, educators can provide students with personalized learning experiences to improve their writing skills and guide the revision process. For example, tools like the Criterion® Online Writing Evaluation Service are designed to help students improve their core writing skills through unlimited opportunities to practice independent writing and invaluable automated feedback. Personalizing learning in this manner empowers students to engage with the material at their own pace .

Benefitting all student and teacher outcomes

We must recognize the interconnectedness of reading and writing when personalizing learning experiences.

In conjunction with this work, educators can empower students to face the challenges of the modern world with confidence and competence. Schools and districts can build better-developed students across all subjects with a renewed approach to critical writing concepts and systematic literacy approaches . Literacy skills unlock a world of opportunities: They are indispensable assets in every learner's journey towards a successful and fulfilling future. 

Want to improve literacy skills in your classroom? Check out the Criterion Online Writing Evaluation Service. 

By Praxis Editorial Team

Using the Tomorrow’s Teacher blog, the writers, thought leaders, and researchers who comprise the Praxis Editorial Team focus on the pedagogical issues that matter most to educators. The goal: to create and sustain a constant dialogue, and to unite the interests of all those who value teaching and learning.

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Home ➔ What's an Essay? ➔ What is a Narrative Essay? ➔ Literacy Narrative

Literacy Narrative Essay Guide

A literacy narrative essay is a first-person account of learning how to read or write. It often discusses the significance of books and other written materials in a person’s life and the role of literacy in society.

Most literacy narratives discuss memories, which means they are based on actual events from the writer’s life. However, some may choose (if possible within the assignment requirements) to fictionalize their stories to explore the theme of literacy more deeply.

The purpose of a literacy narrative is to reflect on the role of literacy in your life and to examine how it has affected you as a reader, writer, or thinker. In some cases, a literacy narrative may also be used to teach others about the importance of literacy, using your or someone else’s personal literacy story.

What is a Narrative Essay? – learn more about narrative essays in general.

Key characteristics of literacy narratives:

• Genre – A literacy narrative is usually a short, first-person story about a significant event in the writer’s life, which can be a rough and exciting journey. It is usually non-fictional.
• Tone – The tone of a literacy narrative is usually reflective and introspective.
• Purpose – A literacy narrative is written to reflect on the role of literacy in the writer’s life. It may also be used to teach others about the importance of literacy.
• Audience – A literacy narrative is typically written for a general audience.
• Structure – A literacy narrative typically has a chronological or linear structure.
• Language – Vivid language and concrete details create a strong sense of place and time.

Common themes and topics examples in literacy narratives:

• The importance of literacy in society
• The power of books and other written materials
• The role of literacy in the writer’s life
• How literacy has affected the writer as a reader, writer, or thinker
• The challenges and triumphs of learning to read or write
• The significance of a particular book or writing experience
• How culture affects writing (based on your experience)

The following are some questions you may want to consider as you write your literacy narrative:

• What are some of the most important moments in your journey as a reader or writer?
• What has literacy meant to you in your life?
• How has literacy shaped who you are as a person?
• What challenges have you faced as a reader or writer?
• How have you overcome these challenges?
• What role has literacy played in your success or failure in school or your career?
• In what ways has your literacy level affected your personal or professional relationships?
• What are your hopes for the future of literacy in our society?

What is a Personal Narrative? – learn more about personal narrative essays.

Features of a Literacy Narrative

Several key features are often found in a literacy essay:

First-person point of view: A literacy narrative is typically told from the first-person point of view, which means that it is written in the first person (I, me, my, we, us). This point of view is used to personalize the story and to give the reader a sense of the writer’s thoughts, feelings, and experiences.

The theme of literacy: As mentioned previously, the central theme of a literacy narrative is usually the importance of books and other written materials in a person’s life. However, some writers may also explore how literacy has affected them personally, such as how it has shaped their identity or their view of the world.

A focus on a particular moment or event: A literacy essay often focuses on a specific moment or event in the writer’s life that was significant to their development as a reader or writer. This event could be something as significant as learning to read for the first time, or it could be a more mundane event, such as realizing the importance of reading to one’s education.

Reflection: A literacy narrative often includes reflection on the writer’s part. This reflection can take the form of discussing the writer’s current relationship to literacy or a more general discussion of how literacy has affected the writer’s life.

A message or moral: Many literacy narratives end with a message or moral, usually about the importance of literacy or the power of words. This message may be explicit, or it may be more subtle.

Short Literacy Narrative Example

Below is a very simple and short essay example of a literacy narrative to give you a basic idea about this assignment.

I remember the first time I ever read a book. I was in kindergarten, and my teacher had us all sit in a circle on the rug. She then brought out a big book and began to read it to us. I was fascinated by the story and the pictures, and I remember thinking to myself, “I want to learn how to do this.” From that moment on, I was hooked on reading, and it changed my life for the better.

Reading has always been an important part of my life. It has helped me to imagine new worlds, learn about different cultures, and understand the world around me. It has also been a source of comfort and escape during difficult times in my life. Whenever I feel stressed or overwhelmed, I can always count on a good book to help me relax and escape my problems.

Books have also played an important role in my success in school. I have always been a good student, but I credit much of my success to my love of reading. Reading has helped me to improve my writing skills and to understand complex concepts better. It has also allowed me to develop a love of learning that has stayed with me throughout my academic career.

While reading has always been important to me, it wasn’t until recently that I realized how much it had shaped my identity. I have always considered myself shy, but I now realize that my love of reading has helped me become more confident and outgoing. Reading has given me the courage to express my own ideas and to share my thoughts with others. It has also helped me connect with people with similar interests and find my voice in the world.

Reading has indeed been a lifelong journey for me, one that has taken me to places I could never have imagined. It has taught me about the world, myself, and the power of words. I am grateful for the role that literacy has played in my life, and I hope that others can find the same joy and satisfaction in reading that I have.

Famous Literacy Story Examples

Here are some original and famous examples of one’s literacy journey that you can read to get inspiration before writing your own story.

“Learning to Read and Write” by Frederick Douglass

Short description: In this essay, Frederick Douglass describes his experiences learning to read and write as a slave in the United States. He discusses how literacy gave him a sense of power and freedom and how it ultimately helped him escape slavery.

“The Lonely, Good Company of Books” by Richard Rodriguez

Short description: In this essay, Richard Rodriguez discusses his love of reading and how it has helped him overcome his life challenges. He describes how books have given him a sense of companionship and how they have helped him to develop his own identity.

“The Writing Life” by Annie Dillard ( Excerpt )

Short description: In this essay, Annie Dillard discusses the joys and challenges of the writing life. She describes how writing can be both a source of great satisfaction and a frustrating endeavor. She also reflects on how her own writing has changed over the years and how her life experiences have shaped it.

“The Joy of Reading and Writing: Superman and Me” by Sherman Alexie

Short description: In this essay, Sherman Alexie discusses how reading and writing helped him to overcome the challenges of growing up on a Native American reservation. He describes how literacy allowed him to connect with the world outside his community and find his place in it.

We hope these literacy narrative examples will help you write one on your own.

Writing Tips for Literacy Narratives

No matter what your experience with reading and writing is, you can write your personal essay on literacy that is meaningful and interesting to you. Here are some tips to get you started:

• Start by brainstorming your experiences with reading and writing. What are some moments that stand out to you? When did you first start learning to read and write? What did you find challenging about it? What were some of the highlights for you?
• Once you have a list of experiences, start thinking about how they relate to each other. What is the overall story you want to tell? What are some of the themes you want to explore?
• Start writing your personal literacy story. Don’t worry about making it perfect; just write your thoughts down. You can always revise and edit your essay later.
• Make sure to include sensory details in your essay. What did you see, hear, smell, taste, and feel during your experiences? This will help your readers to connect with your story.
• Be honest and open in your writing. Tell your story from your own perspective and allow your personality to shine through this interesting journey.
• Have fun with it! Writing a literacy narrative can be a great way to reflect on your own journey with reading and writing. Allow yourself to explore your memories and emotions as you write.

How to Write a Narrative Essay – essential steps required to write a good narrative essay.

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The Checkup

Literacy Builds Life Skills as Well as Language Skills

By Perri Klass, M.d.

• Oct. 16, 2017

Schoolchildren who read and write at home with their parents may build not only their academic literacy skills, but also other important life and learning skills, a recent study found.

The project, a study by researchers at the University of Washington , followed children for five years, either grades one through five or three through seven. It looked at their reading and writing activities at home, their school progress and their skills, both according to their parents’ reports and according to annual assessments.

In the study, published in May in the Journal of Educational and Psychological Consultation by Nicole Alston-Abel and Virginia W. Berninger, parents were asked to rate their children’s ability to pay attention, set goals, control impulses and regulate their level of activity. Dr. Berninger, who is professor emerita of educational psychology at the University of Washington, said, “It’s not just the skills the parents teach at home, it’s also how they help their children’s self-regulation, sometimes called executive function.” Writing, she said, was just as important as reading, and the children in the study tended to struggle harder with writing, and to get more help with those assignments from their parents.

Well over 20 years ago, when we started using books at pediatric checkups, we called it literacy promotion. Then for a while, “school readiness” was the buzzword and the byword, so, not unreasonably, we talked about school readiness. And as more and more attention was drawn to early brain development, it seemed clear, as we talked about getting books into children’s hands and children’s homes, that what we were really trying to do was help foster the language-rich parent-child interactions that build children’s brains.

I still serve as national medical director of Reach Out and Read , a national program that works through pediatric primary care to encourage parents to read with their young children. We now reach 4.8 million children every year through more than 5,800 clinics and practices. We counsel parents about developmentally appropriate techniques for enjoying books with infants, toddlers and preschoolers, and we give out books at checkups through 5 years of age.

When we discuss our program and our evidence, we talk about trying to support positive and responsive parenting, since young children learn best from back and forth. We also talk about “serve and return” interactions (child-adult-child-adult) and “dialogic reading” (asking questions, letting the child help tell the story), and we try to make it clear that reading with a 1-year-old or a 2-year-old is less about reciting all the words of a story and more about pointing and naming, question and answer, and of course, about the affection and the sense of security that will leave a child with positive associations with books and reading.

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Home — Essay Samples — Education — Literacy — Literacy Narrative: My Development In Reading And Writing

Literacy Narrative: My Development in Reading and Writing

• Categories: Literacy Personal Beliefs Personal Experience

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Published: Mar 18, 2021

Words: 1015 | Pages: 2 | 6 min read

Works Cited

• Frey, N., & Fisher, D. (2007). Reading for information in elementary school: Content literacy strategies to build comprehension. Prentice Hall.
• Graham, S., & Hebert, M. (2011). Writing to read: Evidence for how writing can improve reading. Carnegie Corporation of New York.
• Nagy, W., & Anderson, R. C. (1984). The number of words in printed school English. Reading Research Quarterly, 19(3), 304-330.
• National Council of Teachers of English. (2018). Writing as a tool for learning. Retrieved from https://www2.ncte.org/resources/positions/writing-as-a-tool-for-learning/
• Pappas, C. C. (2014). Literacy narratives and the teacher education classroom: Exploring the potential for transformative learning. Journal of Language and Literacy Education, 10(1), 44-61.
• Powell, J. (2018). An Introduction to Education Studies. Sage Publications Ltd.
• Rappleye, J. (2017). Essential study skills. Cengage Learning.
• The International Literacy Association. (2019). The power of literacy. Retrieved from https://www.literacyworldwide.org/docs/default-source/resource-documents/2019-ila-power-of-literacy.pdf?sfvrsn=9da89fc2_2
• The National Institute of Child Health and Human Development. (2000). Report of the National Reading Panel. Teaching children to read: An evidence-based assessment of the scientific research literature on reading and its implications for reading instruction (NIH Publication No. 00-4769). U.S. Government Printing Office.
• Wilkinson, L. (2018). The essentials of academic writing. Sage Publications Ltd.

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The Impact of Illiteracy and the Importance of Early Intervention

Nicola Miranda

Around 1 in 5 people are completely illiterate. Additionally, around 3 billion people around the world struggle with basic level reading and writing ( World Literacy Foundation  [WLF], 2018). This has significant economic, social, and health impacts at both an individual and societal level.

Economic Impact

The  World Literacy Foundation  (2018) reported that illiteracy and low levels of literacy have estimated to cost the global economy approximately £800 billion annually. Specifically, in the UK, illiteracy costs their economy around £80 billion in 2018 due to costs associated with welfare, unemployment, and social programs, as well as reduced government tax revenue and productivity. 

Furthermore, as the global economy moves more towards a knowledge economy, literacy is an essential skill for individuals and states to compete in the global economy. When a high proportion of the adult population has poor literacy skills, many positions remain vacant as insufficient individuals are adequately skilled to fulfill those roles. This results in slower GDP growth in the long term (Lal, 2015).

Social Impact

Individuals with low levels of literacy are more likely to experience poorer employment opportunities and outcomes and lower income. As a result, they often face welfare dependency, low self-esteem, and higher levels of crime. Moreover, people with a low level of literacy have limited ability to make important informed decisions in everyday life as they struggle with tasks such as filling out forms and applications, understanding government policies, reading medicine or nutritional labels, and more ( WLF, 2018 ).

Furthermore, parents who are functionally illiterate often prioritize work before education, have lower expectations in regards to schooling, and the children of parents who fail to complete primary school are more likely to follow in their footsteps and do likewise. This leads to a cycle of disadvantage through generations. On the other hand, strong literacy skills among parents will have positive impacts on their children’s lives as they are more able to help and encourage their children in their schoolwork and communicate with their teachers effectively ( WLF, 2018 ).

You can help by donating to the World Literacy Foundation here.

Just $10 can help to provide key educational resources to children..

Health Impact

Berkman et al.  (2004) found that people with low levels of literacy are more likely to experience adverse health outcomes, have poor health literacy, and practice poor health behaviors. For example, people with low levels of health literacy are more likely to experience:

• Higher hospital admission rates
• A lack of engagement with health services such as cancer screening
• A lack of understanding and adherence to medical advice

Moreover, the recent COVID-19 pandemic has exposed the great lack of health literacy globally. During this time, many people were challenged in understanding and applying the health information provided by health professionals and the government (Paakkari & Okan, 2020). Adequate health literacy is important in ensuring that people are able to understand and correctly apply health information to prevent disease, and the failure to do so increases the risk for disease transmission.

An Effective Solution: Early Intervention 

Early interventions targeting children in early childhood could be the most effective approach to increasing literacy skills in the long term. According to a  Harvard study  (2007), brain development occurs rapidly in the first few years of life, before formal schooling even begins, where over one million new neural connections are made every second. During these years, sensory pathways for early language skills and higher cognitive functions already begin to develop. 

Developing literacy and language skills before formal schooling sets a child up for success in school and life. Children with a poor foundation in literacy before entering formal schooling are more likely to struggle academically and to drop out of school, increasing their likelihood of facing poorer employment and social outcomes in the future. Moreover, the quality of the environment at home and early childhood services is one of the key factors for literacy development. Hence, early childhood is a critical stage for parents and early childhood services to facilitate learning experiences for children ( Royal Children’s Hospital, 2008 ).

Rather than addressing the issue of poor literacy in adults when it arises, it is better to prevent the problem and its consequences in the first place through early childhood interventions. While investments in early childhood programs are commonly argued to be a burden on state budgets and taxpayers,  Heckman  (2018) found that quality early childhood programs actually have a 13% return rate for investment per annum as a result of improved education, health, social and economic outcomes. With these significant returns, these early childhood programs will pay for themselves eventually over time. Therefore, investments in early childhood education, particularly for children from low socioeconomic backgrounds, will lead to short- and long-term social and economic gains.

For instance,  World Literacy Foundation’s  work in Victoria focuses on providing early literacy skills and school preparedness for children aged 0-5 years from low-socioeconomic backgrounds. For example, the organization’s work includes educating new parents to support their children in their learning, providing regular reading groups, and distributing books to young children who may lack access to them.

With the significant economic, social, and health costs low levels of literacy have on individuals, communities, and societies, this is a global issue that needs to be addressed. Investing in early childhood literacy programs will bring back greater returns not only economically, but also returns in health and social outcomes. 

Written by: Amanda Low & Nicola Miranda

• Berkman, N. D., Dewalt, D. A., Pignone, M. P., Sheridan, S. L., Lohr, K. N., Sutton, S. F., … Bonito A. J. (2004). 87 Literacy and Health Outcomes: Summary. In AHRQ Evidence Report Summaries . Rockville, MD: Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (US). Retrieved from https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK11942/
• Center on the Developing Child (2007). InBrief: The Science of Early Childhood Development . Retrieved from https://developingchild.harvard.edu/resources/inbrief-science-of-ecd/#:~:text=In%20the%20first%20few%20years,brain%20circuits%20become%20more%20efficient
• Heckman. (2018). Social Media Content: Early Investments and Return on Investment for ECE/Childcare. Retrieved from https://heckmanequation.org/resource/social-posts-early-investments-and-return-on-investment-for-ece-childcare/
• Lal, B. S. (2015). The Economic and Social Cost of Illiteracy Overview. International Journal of Advance Research and Innovative Ideas in Education, 1 (5), 665. Retrieved from https://www.researchgate.net/publication/311562787_The_Economic_and_Social_Cost_of_Illiteracy_An_Overview
• Paakkari, L., & Okan, O. (2020). COVID-19: health literacy is an underestimated problem. The Lancet. Public health, 5(5), e249–e250. https://doi.org/10.1016/S2468-2667(20)30086-4
• Royal Children’s Hospital. Literacy in Early Childhood. Retrieved from https://ww2.rch.org.au/emplibrary/ccch/PB13_Literacy_EarlyChildhood.pdf
• World Literacy Foundation. (n.d.). Australia. Retrieved from https://worldliteracyfoundation.org/australia/
• World Literacy Foundation. (2018). The Economic & Social Costs of Illiteracy . Retrieved from TheEconomicSocialCostofIlliteracy-2.pdf  

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Just $10 can help to provide key educational resources to children, examples of illiteracy, types of illiteracy, cultural illiteracy, emotional illiteracy, civic illiteracy.

economic illiteracy consequences of illiteracy definition of illiteracy types of illiteracy what is the meaning of illiteracy what are the causes of illiteracy synonyms of illiteracy illiteracy and poverty historical illiteracy high illiteracy rate computer illiteracy biblical illiteracy cause of illiteracy science illiteracy civic illiteracy

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LSG: Moral support – using the curriculum to foster ethical literacy in Scottish learners

The Learned Societies’ Group on Scottish STEM Education’s (LSG) report highlighting the importance of teaching ethical literacy in schools.

The report raises questions about how the school curriculum might be updated to better equip young people with the intellectual toolkit they need to navigate an increasingly complicated modern world. The LSG brings together the learned societies and professional associations with a focus on the provision of STEM education at school.

LSG Moral support – using the curriculum to foster ethical literacy in Scottish learners report (567KB, PDF)

In June 2023, the Learned Societies Group on Scottish STEM education (hereafter the LSG) convened a cross-sectoral interactive workshop at the Royal Society of Edinburgh (RSE). The aims of the workshop were:

• to explore whether the teaching of ethical literacy should be a greater priority for schools, as part of a Scottish education system that is fit for the challenges that we increasingly face as the 21st century unfolds, for example in relation to the growing prevalence and capabilities of generative artificial intelligence software;
• to explore what practical steps might be taken to improve the teaching of ethical literacy within the Scottish education system.

Our invitees included teachers, parents, academics, representatives from various educational and non-profit organisations, and young people themselves.

This report first provides a summary and overview of the discussions which took place during the June 2023 workshop. It then also summarises the main themes which emerged from a subsequent roundtable discussion, held at the RSE in October 2023, which sought to identify specific, practical steps and follow-up actions related to the workshop’s original aims.

Please note that the commentaries presented in this report represent a record of the discussions which took place at the two RSE meetings and the views and opinions of the meeting participants. It does not necessarily reflect any official view or policy position of the organisations or professional bodies to which the meeting participants are affiliated or which they represent.

It is hoped, nevertheless, that this report will be of interest to a wide range of stakeholders and will prove a useful resource to stimulate further discussion and debate on a critical issue for Scottish education.

Professor Martin Hendry Chair, LSG, April 2024

Executive summary

Young people are inundated by information on a daily basis. Whether this exposure is deliberate or incidental, the sheer volume and speed makes it increasingly difficult to determine what is trustworthy, particularly when modern technology means that anyone or anything can be given a potentially sizeable platform. The consequences of relying on the unreliable can compound over time until an individual’s entire worldview is shaped by misinformation. Evidence of this abounds in our increasingly polarised society in which everyone is convinced their corner of the Internet – and, by extension, their version of the truth – is correct.

Surrounded by smart phones and social media that are increasingly supercharged by powerful generative AI tools, young people need the tools to evaluate and use information responsibly. A large part of this upskilling centres on the development of ethical literacy: learning to unravel how and why information is generated for mass consumption. Much like the scientific method, ethical literacy systematically considers the motivations that underlie knowledge generation. Who benefits from others believing this information? Who has provided the funding? Are the messages intended to empower or to marginalise, to mislead or to educate?

Nurturing ethical literacy is a complex but critical process. The most obvious place to start would be the school curriculum. Although the Curriculum for Excellence (CfE) affords opportunities for ethical learning in theory, it is not always used to best effect and could be supplemented by other types of interventions. Scottish society is also in the process of questioning what it wants and needs from its education system, now and into an increasingly uncertain future. Ethical literacy must be regarded as an indispensable part of a modern education system, of equal importance to existing competencies and capacities and meaningfully captured by assessments and qualifications.

The Learned Societies’ Group on Scottish STEM Education (LSG) identifies and promotes priorities for school STEM education in Scotland. This includes providing advice on school STEM education to decision makers, including Ministers, MSPs, civil servants, and local authority representatives. With secretariat support provided by the Royal Society of Edinburgh (RSE), its membership includes the Association for Science Education (ASE), British Computer Society (BCS), Edinburgh Mathematical Society (EMS), Institute of Physics (IOP), Institution of Engineering and Technology (IET), Royal Society of Biology (RSB), Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC), and Scottish Mathematical Council (SMC).

Throughout the past year, the LSG has undertaken a series of engagement activities to determine how the Scottish curriculum can be used to foster ethical literacy in conjunction with the wider learning and social environment. We sought to understand how the system currently views and supports ethical literacy, identify existing good practice that could be scaled up, and anticipate the key obstacles and challenges to implementation. Our goal was not to single-handedly diagnose and remedy the issue, but rather to initiate influential dialogue on the growing importance of ethical literacy and champion it as a priority in the wake of the education reform agenda. Significantly, we wanted to encourage stakeholders to consider their role in making our collective aspirations of an ethically literate society a reality.

This report presents the culmination of that engagement work. Its key findings are summarised below.

1. The reasons for pursuing ethical literacy range from the practical to the existential. Whether we want individuals to avoid falling prey to phishing scams or to understand how misinformation threatens democracy, ethical literacy is non-negotiable for surviving and thriving in the 21st century. Everyone stands to benefit from ethical literacy and the associated skills it engenders – from critical thinking to compassion to resilience – are universally applicable.

2. Ethical literacy is not just about avoiding the harmful – it is also about empowering young people to mobilise information as a force for good.

3. The toxic public discourse that surrounds the most important issues of our time – from climate change to poverty to geopolitical instability – is affecting the mental health and wellbeing of society and ethical literacy is a key part of the solution.

4. Shared societal values – transmitted by the education system and consolidated by other key actors – provide the scaffolding on which young people can develop more personalised ethical frameworks.

5. The teaching of ethical literacy should afford learners with the space and reassurance to have difficult conversations, acknowledging that ethical issues are complicated and rarely lend themselves to clear-cut answers or outcomes. This process may be uncomfortable and messy, but it is essential in moving away from the insular bubbles that undermine genuine debate and understanding. Young people increasingly inhabit a world in which they simply shut down when faced with opposing viewpoints – or worse, expect that such perspectives can be suppressed or prevented from existing in the first place.

6. Science can be an effective vehicle to initiate broader discussions of ethical literacy.

7. Ethical literacy does not happen spontaneously and must be an explicit aim of the education system. There would also be a need to look beyond what is done in school and link students’ learning and experiences to their home environment and their communities.

8. Ethical literacy must begin in early childhood before young people become entrenched in social media and other information channels.

9. It is critical to consider how the teaching of ethical literacy evolves at the interface between primary and secondary to ensure ethical literacy exists on a continuum. Primary school can lay an effective foundation for more sophisticated ethical reasoning in later years, yet the rigid structures of the senior phase often stifle the multi- and interdisciplinarity from which ethical literacy naturally grows.

10. Ethical literacy cannot be taught in silos and existing tools should be better harnessed and integrated across subjects and across the curriculum, particularly in the secondary phase with its longstanding fixation on narrow national assessments. The original vision of the CfE offers a useful framework and starting point for advocating the kinds of engagement and multi-disciplinary, collaborative approaches that would be appropriate and useful to improve ethical literacy. There would be merit in examining how the current CfE infrastructure could better incorporate ethical literacy (for example, within Broad General Education (BGE) General Science or in subjects like Modern Studies).

11. Ethical literacy must be grounded in active participation and co-creation with young people.

12. Ethical literacy requires the use of practical tools in the classroom.

13. Teaching ethical literacy can be daunting and the profession must be supported to deliver this learning with confidence and contemporary understanding. This includes addressing longstanding teacher recruitment and retention shortages – particularly in STEM secondary.

14. Traditional attainment metrics may not succeed at capturing ethical literacy will be a challenge. A more holistic means for students to demonstrate their skills – for example, as proposed by the Scottish Diploma of Achievement by the Independent Review of Qualifications and Assessment – may be required.

15. The current reform agenda presents a critical opportunity to embed ethical literacy into our curriculum and assessment structures in order to better serve Scotland’s learners.

We hope this report stimulates further debate about ethical literacy and leads to enlightened action to ensure Scotland’s learners can meaningfully participate in our hyper-connected, information-rich society with consent, agency, and empathy.

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