More like “School alone is the one place one cannot become literate.” I doubt a SINGLE KID now learns to read exclusively in a public school, there is ALWAYS outside help to teach him the RIGHT WAY to read.
I entered primary school in 1968. There were a dozen or so kids from that kindergarten class who graduated high school together in the spring of 1981.
Those of us who had been taught basic reading skills at home, before we started our formal schooling, were all able to succeed based on our own level of motivation.
The handful that started kindergarten with no ability to read were behind from the beginning, and they were behind at the end.
“The handful that started kindergarten with no ability to read were behind from the beginning, and they were behind at the end. “
Yep, and do not, for a minute, think it’s not intentional. They now use ‘Sight Words’ though 3rd grade to teach ‘reading’. Pretty much no different than Whole Language, and with exactly the same results...nothing learned.
Then, in 4th grade, those kids who were not lucky enough to be taught separately from the schools finally start on Phonics. Once can only imagine where their lives will go.
The fact that they do, eventually, go to Phonics is their admission that Phonics actually does work, and the fact that they delay its use for years, when they know it works on kids at least as young as 3 years old, is evidence that what they’re doing is intentional.