A family literacy project serving Mexican immigrants taught parents how to encourage literacy development of their children aged three through five and fostered parents' critical literacy by first meeting their needs for functional literacy. Parent participants increased the time spent reading to their children, provided more reading materials at…

Presents a study to assess scientific literacy of a group of students at a moderately sized midwestern university (n=90). Describes the methodology used to create a multiple-choice test field tested on 75 elementary preservice teachers. Outcomes indicate that achievement was not influenced by age, sex, high school size, or a possible future career…

Issues that are relevant to promoting the intellectual potential and trained competence of the U.S. population are addressed. Important concerns include the following: preventing retardation among unborn children and young children; providing essential early childhood experiences through programs such as Head Start; and insuring literacy among…

Discusses problems facing developing nations in achieving UNESCO's goal of equality of educational opportunity. Mentions continuing inequality in literacy rates between developed and developing countries, and between the sexes. Describes functional illiteracy. Blames lack of progress on rates of demographic growth, pace of educational expansion,…

Reveals that literacy training in small, rural, and primitive communities can affect demonstrable changes in the feelings, attitudes, and well-being of its participants. Utilized interviews, discussions, and observations at two sites in Zambia to highlight the outcomes of literacy training. Discusses the program's weaknesses as well as strengths.…

Singapore's leading literacy policy is affected by a tension between the ideologies associated with English and those attached to Singapore's mother tongues. Singaporeans must safeguard their heritages, keeping themselves open to the places where their ancestors came from by learning their designated mother tongues. At the same time, Singaporeans…

The World Bank is a body that declares its vision to be a world free of poverty. It has long recognised that poverty and illiteracy are closely correlated and that illiteracy is a hindrance to economic and social development. The 180 or so governments that own the Bank have declared literacy to be a human right, so the Bank itself presumably also…

This article was based on the author's field study of the Iraqi Literacy campaign in late 1979 and on his follow-up work in 1981. The author spent several weeks interviewing campaign officials, administrators, teachers, and students throughout the country. The article presents the campaign's political philosophy, design, and strategies. (SSH)

There are more than 4 million small businesses across the country that provide more than half of private sector employment, generate 47 percent of the gross national product, and generate two out of every three new jobs in the United States. Because small businesses provide the majority of new workers with their first work experience, they are at…

Presents several lesson plans using newspapers to develop critical thinking skills that the author has used in critical thinking, English-as-a-Second-Language (ESL), and English composition classes. Examines news writing, the inverted pyramid, organization and language usage, letters to the editor, and how to critically analyze survey results. (CH)

Two studies investigated the performance of Florida high school seniors on the Tests of General Educational Development (GED Tests). The GED Test Battery, as revised in 1980, consists of 290 items in 5 subject areas (writing, social studies, science, reading, and mathematics). In the first study, the performance of 1,200 Florida students was…

In 2000, approximately 877 million adults worldwide were illiterate and 113 million children did not attend school. More than two-thirds of those individuals lived in East and South Asia, and two-thirds were females. Functional illiteracy remains high in developed and developing nations alike. The reasons include weak training in how to teach…