Alternative title for this post:
Why Many Teacher-Training Programs Should Be Abolished
Perhaps some of you — at least in the USA — have noticed the phenomenon of college students using multi-syllabic words out of context. The student clearly does not know what the word he or she inserted into the sentence actually means.
I used to think this was an attempt to impress me in the hopes of getting a higher grade on the writing assignment — pull a complicated-sounding but inaccurate word from an online thesaurus instead of using something simpler. But perhaps the behavior is really a sign that the student is deficient in some basic literacy skills.
As pointed out in this National Public Radio story, millions of children in the USA do not learn how to read well at an early age because of the unscientific and ineffective methods used by their teachers. If children fall behind in the first few years of primary school, it’s probably difficult for them to become proficient readers later on. I’m now wondering if these deficits in literacy persist all the way into college.