Nearly 30 years ago, Chall, Jacobs, and Baldwin introduced the fourth-grade slump to describe the unexpected deceleration of reading skills between first and fourth grades among children growing up in poverty and low-income households. Advances in our understanding of reading development and how race, racism, or other forms of discrimination are…

College of Education faculty and staff at an HBCU developed an educational justice based reading club for freshmen teacher preparation students in an effort to provide authentic and important retention and reading experiences. The project sought to increase student retention through the building of this community and passion for educational…

Post-matric students from under-resourced (historically disadvantaged) black high schools generally encounter difficulties in their academic work at university. The study reported here was intended to empower first year (post-matric) students from these schools with basic research skills in a bid to counteract the effects of their high school…

The implication of reading competence in developing reflection and thinking is an important issue for student teachers to consider. Reading is also a competence, in which the language at the disposal of a person is included, to use for social development and mutual understanding. This article is based on a case study and is concerned with how some…

Reports on a study that examined the literacy behavior of 132 elderly Blacks in a large city environment with a high concentration of undereducated adults. Found that the group developed the necessary literacy skills to meet the demands of their social environment. (JOW)

This article describes how a group of black women read culture, class, and other social relations, analyzing the process and skill of reading linguistic and paralinguistic cues in allowing individuals to navigate across multiple discourses. I draw from one ethnographic study of talk in a Midwestern hair salon. Such research seeks to strengthen…

According to a National Assessment of Educational Progress report, most American school children have mastered reading and writing fundamentals without learning how to analyze, evaluate, and extend ideas they read and write about. To address this "surface understanding" problem, the report recommends literacy programs aimed at high risk…

This study examined factors contributing to poor literacy and numeracy development among black South African children ages 5.5 to 7 years. Findings pointed to a conglomerate of factors, namely inadequate visual-motor integration, poor visual analysis and synthesis, poor fine motor development, and inadequate exposure to mediated reading and…

Reports on research conducted by doctoral students at Florida State University from 1973 until the present regarding the education of disadvantaged populations, primarily Blacks. Shows that disadvantaged students have adequate self-concepts, can be taught to read, and can be taught to think and read critically. (FL)

Discussed is the success of a small university in placing African Americans into medical school and pharmacy school. Described are precollege enrichment programs for mathematics and science that emphasize problem solving, homework, daily quizzes, development of vocabulary and reading skills, peer support groups, role models, and parental…

This chapter argues that a detailed, grounded understanding of classroom literacy practices as well as of learners' writing is crucial to begin to change the ongoing and patently unequal educational outcomes that schools often produce. It is impossible to intervene realistically and effectively in an evidential vacuum. The 1955 "Brown v.…