Dining for Adult Literacy

I've been involved with Project Literacy US for over a year, first as a tutor and then as a board member. Bergen County PLUS is a coordinated effort to increase the level of public consciousness on the issues of adult literacy. In addition, Bergen County PLUS provides qualified volunteer tutors to teach and guide adults in need of basic reading assistance. At present there are approximately 45 tutor-student teams meeting weekly. There is also a waiting list of students that need a tutor that is about two or three times as long as those being served.

I know that literacy is often low on the list of social concerns. I mean, how hard is it to learn how to read? Kids do it all the time! But the thing is, low literacy skills are correlated with a host of problems such as, higher poverty rates, lower wages, more public assistance use, and higher health care expenses (See the results of the National Assessments of Adult Literacy (NAALs)). I'm not saying that teaching an adult to read will necessarily lift them out of poverty. However, not being able to read proficiently will only make it that much harder for someone to make a better life for themselves.

So, if you're in Bergen County, NJ and would like to contribute to PLUS you can contact them at plusb@aol.com. You can also spend some cash at the Annual Gala on October 13, 2007. I'll be there!

Project Literacy U.S. is happy to announce its

Fourth Annual Gala



An Evening in Tuscany



Saturday, October 13, 2007



at The Skylands Castle

Ringwood, New Jersey



Honoree: Mary Higgins Clark



Music by the Infernos
**Black Tie**



Tickets available by calling 201-489-7066

Major credit cards accepted.
All the proceeds benefit adult literacy.

Speaking of communication

Literacy is a minor, but persistant issue in the US. According to the National Adult Literacy Survey, in 1992, about half of all adult Americans had difficulty reading and using written material.

One place where limited literacy has measurable consequences is healthcare. People with low literacy skills tend to be sicker. Part of the problem seems to be that they do not follow the direction of their doctors because they don't understand it.

Now this is not a new problem, and the AMA has been involved with it for a while.

But what bothers me is that a key recommendation from many "experts" in health literacy is that materials written for patients be written at the 6th grade reading level according to the Fry test. Here are the recommendations from the AMA:

Text construction
• Write at or below the 6th grade level.
• Use one- or two-syllable words.
• Use short paragraphs.
• Use active voice.

The Fry test pushes you to write short words and short sentences on the assumption that these are easier to read. But there is no evidence that short words are necissarily easier to read. And requiring short sentences means writers often leave out optional grammatical words (like that) and all the nice little linking words that tie the thoughts in your sentences together. What you end up with is a staccatto paragraph with no context or relationship between sentences. I would imagine that type of sentence is much harder to read.

Of course no linguists were consulted in making up these recommendations.