 |
Transcript
LITERACY INQUIRY
Alan Jones Programme - Radio 2UE
1 December 2004
Interviewer:
We’re spending in New South Wales almost $9,000 on each school in government education. I think what Brendan Nelson’s asking is “Are you getting value for money?” The Minister is on the line, Brendan Nelson, good morning.
Brendan Nelson:
Good morning Alan.
Interviewer:
Your critics will say this is a knee jerk reaction to a warning, in April, from 26 academics.
Brendan Nelson:
Well firstly I’d say to those critics Alan, and I’d also say to the Premier, Bob Carr, just go out to the Exodus Foundation in Sydney, in Sydney’s west near Ashfield, and just spend a little bit of time - just one hour with Reverend Bill Crews. Because when he’s not feeding the poor or keeping drug addicts alive or counselling prostitutes, Alan, out the back of the Church, we’re co-funding with a Macquarie University programme, where Bill’s got a bus going out and picks up kids that have spent five years in Australia’s education system, in New South Wales public schools, who cannot read a single word Alan, not a single word.
In fact one child said “I didn’t realise it’s the black stuff you read”. And Alan, within six months they take those children, with a team of volunteers, from nought to reading a piece of poetry they’ve written to an audience when we go to the Graduation. So I say to Bob Carr, just get out of your office, get out there and just spend a bit of time with them and if you think there’s no problem - I think any sensible person will be convinced there is.
Interviewer:
Many of the great educationalists have said in the past that education values also, as well as being a function of teaching, a function of environment, the American researchers Betty Harth and Todd R Ridley, wrote in the journal American Educator in the Spring of 2001, that the average four-year-old child whose parents have a professional occupation is exposed to 32 million more words than children in welfare dependent families. So can any reading programme overcome that vocabulary deficit?
Brendan Nelson:
Well firstly Alan I think a lot of kids who come from higher income families, and families where they have higher levels of education, I think they’re more likely to be able to learn irrespective, if you like, of the teaching method that’s used. There’s a thing called whole of language which argues that kids learn to read in the same way they learn to speak. If you hear it often enough you basically learn it. But basically the argument that’s put is that kids who come from disadvantaged backgrounds in some way are less capable of learning. In fact what most disadvantages those children is ineffective teaching methods.
Interviewer:
Are you saying - is your information telling you that the phonics method needs to be used more where words are sounded out versus the whole word method? (Inaudible)
Brendan Nelson:
Well it’s found Alan that there is, over the last 20 years, what’s taken root in Australian education is the belief that whole of language approach, at the exclusion of phonics, is the best way to teach children.
Interviewer:
They’ll learn on their own?
Brendan Nelson:
Yes, that’s right. In other words that you don’t actually need to teach them about syllables and sounding out words and the reality is that if you come from a reading deprived family that’s exactly what you need. All of our kids aren’t (inaudible) and they all need a different approach to master their reading.
Alan I’ve got to tell your listeners that the Queensland University of Technology is about to publish a study of 370 teachers. Half of the teachers could not tell you what a syllable is and three quarters could not correctly (inaudible) the sounds in words.
Now how on earth are those teachers going to help children who are having difficulty with their reading to actually do the (inaudible) and learn the basics of reading?
Interviewer:
You’re quite right, you’re 100% correct. If literacy teaching is such a success why do universities have to set up classes in remedial grammar?
Brendan Nelson:
Well precisely. And I’ve got to say Alan I have people applying for jobs with me over the years who’ve got blinking law degrees and the first thing I’ve got to do as I go down the application is correct the spelling. You’ve got to ask yourself if you want to set your kids up for failure in life, allow them to go from primary school to secondary school barely able to read.
What we’re going to do here Alan, is we’re going to get to the bottom of it. We’re going to find out exactly how our kids are being taught to read, how our teachers are being trained to read and how are the kids being tested.
Interviewer:
Are we going over old ground? There was a 2002 Parliamentary Report called Boys Getting It Right, which you’d be aware of, which concluded that the whole language approach had failed most students, especially boys. It said our teaching methods have produced alarming levels of illiteracy.
Brendan Nelson:
Well certainly, I chaired the inquiry, and the reading and the teaching of reading is one part of it. What I’ve got here now, is I’ve got ten people, I’ve got quite a few ‘experts’ if you like, but I’ve also got some normal people. I’ve got a women for example, a mother who wrote to me from Port Melbourne, she said “I am a concerned Mum with a son and from no fault of his own has been to Hell and back learning to read. I have no qualification in education and only a layman’s understanding of the issue”. She said “every year since Prep I’ve told his teachers that I thought he had a problem, and every teacher reassured me he’s fine, that he’s working well in class, he’s an average student. I don’t understand why my son could write no more than his name at the top of the page for all of Grade 3, and still be given a good report. I don’t know why, when I told them my son did not know the difference between a vowel and a consonant or when to use a capital letter, his Grade 4 teacher assured me it wasn’t a problem”.
I put her on the inquiry.
Interviewer:
Good on you. Good on you. When will you report?
Brendan Nelson:
I’ve asked them to report in the second half of next year. In fact I told Ken Rowe to deliver the report by August or September. We’ll be taking public submissions up until around the end of March. There will be hearings that will be conducted by the inquiry. They’ll be supported from a secretariat in my office and I’ll be expecting the government and the non-government authorities to co-operate with the national inquiry and I’m very determined to implement the recommendations.
Interviewer:
Well if you can get the details about how big you can make the submissions then I’ll let our listeners know.
Brendan Nelson:
Thank you very much Alan.
Interviewer:
You’re most welcome. Thank you for your time. That’s Dr Brendan Nelson, the Federal Minister for Education.
|
