Adolescent literacy

[kimberkit]

I recently read an article that defined "adolescent literacy" as the ability to comprehend and make meaning of writing in a variety of mediums: internet-speak, newspapers, textbooks, email, fiction, nonfiction.

So, I have a confession to make: I am functionally illiterate. I don't follow the newspapers faithfully (Matt T had to explain what the big fuss with the Karl Rove case was), because it makes me feel helpless or angry to see the news half the time, when I don't plan on going into politics. I don't speak AOL. I can read nonfiction well enough, and comprehend it, but I don't give a damn half the time because it usually comes across as academics farting around, and, as far as I can tell, not doing much to save the world, even if they sometimes have interesting theories that may or may not work.

I think the point of the article was that adolescents have to differentiate between all the mediums they're inundated with, but that really should have taken a sentence.

Anyway. Either I'm a sad failure of the education system, or "adolescent literacy" is a meaningless term. Probably some of both -- I really should be more interested in watching the world fall apart by the seams, rather than wondering what I can do to save it, and I probably should be less disrespectful of the intelligentsia. And "adolescent literacy" is just another buzzword replacement for "secondary reading fluency and knowing how to tell academic writing from non-academic writing."

Comments

[kimberkit.livejournal.com]

Motivation fuels ability. If you have no motivation to open a book, you will never improve your skills, and so, for a comprehensive definition of literacy, most people say that you have to have a certain curiousity, or guiding set of questions, to get you through something you really don't want to read. Since I lack all curiousity and motivation, I'm "illiterate" :P

[lostsilmaril.livejournal.com]

Well smoke my beard and call me curly! I'm illiterate too.

It's a bad definition. Humph, so there.

[shellaby.livejournal.com]

Oh, I don't like that definition. I think it is extending the meaning of "literacy" beyond its realm of meaning. They're trying to define a student who can not only read, but be motivated and interested in reading in all these media; they need to find another word than 'literate'. This definition is almost like a judgement on a person!