I disagree with the author. Poor reading skills only account for a small part of it. The main reason kids are underachievers is because of low expectations by the parents.
I grew up in poverty.
But we had a World Book Encyclopedia and a bunch of National Geographic Info books.
I learned to love to learn.
Anyone want to put hard $ on the kids in the OP having tattoos on their arms, neck and even their cheeks?
It is 100% on the parents to teach about values and not making stupid decisions.
Being unable to read effortlessly may be a starting factor but , I see through the years a lot of people who are quite content to let others “make the decisions.” Some people are followers and a smaller percentage are leaders or independent (such as myself) and are self-employed . I think a lot has to do with the smothering and constant supervision kids have now . Virtually everything these kids do depends on others setting everything up and all they need to do is be there ... no opportunity to fail at even the littlest thing and learn from it . This hovering either from parents or governmental agencies is what initiates lack of motivation....I couldn’t wait to get on my own and boy was it tough....but I did it and so have a lot of others .
The article omits the need for math skills as well as reading and writing
But what is probably obvious is that this was not a public school.
I spend a lot of time on on screen activities and read far more than I used to.
News flash. The parent(s) are ultimately responsible for a child’s education and motivation.
My theory, a lot of young people don’t know how to relate to the world because parents don’t talk to their kids, they talk at them.
A lot of rubbish. Reading skills do not in and of themselves provide motivation. If anything reading skill are obtained through motivation. This idiot has cause and effect reversed. Literacy and intelligence are two utterly different things. A motivated and intelligent person will overcome the obstacles presented by illiteracy.
Reading and writing are the narrowest forms of literacy. Comprehension and communication are the broadest forms. There are plenty of literate lazy incompetent peoples. There are many examples intelligent hard working people who are unable to read or write.
A good friend and I attend the same small town school in the 1950-60s. We were taught to read with phonics, learned to write in cursive using old time penmanship, learned math with flash cards and thought provoking story oroblems and participated in music programs. We have often compared our school experience with contempoary education. My friend refers to modern K-12 schools as failure factories that are destroying generations of students, by failing to teach them the basics especially reading.
The OP’s letter does not provide enough information for an adequate response.
She says her adult children are underachievers, which means they’re capable of doing more than they’re doing.
That doesn’t sound as if they’re poor readers.
Motivation comes from hope. All of those things in life that give hope are now under fire. God, religion, family - under fire. Self-determinism, dreams and ambition, reaching for the stars - all under fire (”you didn’t build that”). We live in a cynical world, and cynicism steals faith and hope, and leads to being lost without direction.
We have younger employees 18 - 21 who have zero desire for improvement or want more responsibility. Most work enough hours to buy more video games, concert tickets and fast food plus put gas in the car if they own one. These “kids” seem to be happy with just enough to get by.
Some teachers are almost forced to give passing or high grades to students who don’t deserve them. The forcing comes from both parents who don’t want the child to ever hear a discouraging word and from school boards who don’t want to be accused of over stressing the students.
Many parents grew up in families that never took completion of homework, good attendance or respecting their teachers as serious, worthy goals. This easy way out of hard work is rationalized and passed on to their children.
It couldn’t be slowing the entire class’ progress down to the slowest students’ pace so as to not allow the slow students to feel an ounce of anxiety or stress at being the "kid left behind." Nah, it couldn’t be that.
It couldn’t be that the policy of mainstreaming disruptive and difficult to teach special needs students in regular classrooms requires an inordinate amount of the teacher’s time which guarantees that regular students get far less instruction time than they should be receiving, all in the name of an illusion goal of liberal equality and fairness which ignores reality. Nah, it couldn’t be that.
It couldn’t be that legislative mandates to spend precious school time studying Liberal pet issues such as global warming, gender and specific racial studies, or learning the Koran to the exclusion of other religious philosophies takes time away from learning much more useful disciplines such as math and real science. Nah, it can’t be that.
The schools needs to be reformed, but it won’t be until we get a better grip on voting reforms. The Socialists are brainwashing our kids, so if we want to give our kids incentives, we need to homeschool. The educators don’t care about the kids, it’s about the money.