16 ms·

Nearly half of adult Canadians struggle with literacy

bioinformatics 6y ago
Yes, noticed that by reading the comments on CBC's site.
- andromeduck 6y ago
  What comments
ARandomerDude 6y ago
> Nearly half of adult Canadians struggle with literacy — and that's bad for the economy Sad that this be couched in monetary terms in order to seem "relevant." As with so many other things, there is a massive qualitative benefit to reading regardless of it's obvious utilitarian or financial advantages.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- thundergolfer 6y ago
  This persistent kind of framing in media is quite possibly a second order effect of the Neoliberal consensus. Markets become the primary tool of societal organisation, and institutions are bent and dented into an orientation toward the economic value system.
  - WalterBright 6y ago
    > Markets become the primary tool of societal organisation Another way to frame that is people buying what they want and people making and selling what other people want. Sounds good to me!
    - atq2119 6y ago
      It's not that that's bad. It's that if everything is viewed only though this particular lens, a wide range of human experience is lost.
      - WalterBright 6y ago
        > a wide range of human experience is lost What is the most important human experience that is lost by markets?
        helmholtz 6y ago
        85% of all animal life, receding glaciers, acidified, deadened oceans, plastic bag islands the size of Texas, depleted drinking water, dwindling natural resources, global uncontrolled rise of temperature, soil erosion, anti-microbial resistance, pandemics, factory farming animal abuse, forest fires, nuclear waste, asbestos in the lungs, lead in the veins, mercury in the nerves, global obesity... ETA: looks like you edited your comment. The original (and rather tone deaf) comment was: "I'm curious what is lost by people doing what they want to do."
        WalterBright 6y ago
        I edited it to make it easier to answer. Your examples are not examples of a properly set up market system. They are spinning off what are called "externalities", which are costs not born by either the buyer or the seller. A properly set up market would apply those costs to the producer. An example of this is CO2 emission should be taxed, not regulated.
        helmholtz 6y ago
        Ah, indeed, no true scotsman would pollute the planet, don't be daft! We are not blessed to be living in a perfect world that can be set up for an ideal market system. For the last four decades, these externalities have gotten ramped up to fever pitch. I'm interested in your take on how, in this world, we get to a point where ALL of the above consequences can be forestalled through HN's favourite hard-on: deregulation and market forces run amok.
- noobermin 6y ago
  While that's true, that's just the headline. The article is pretty good, and touches not just on individuals but effects on democracy for example.
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
d3ckard 6y ago
I think the problem is wider. In Poland average Pole doesn't read even one book a year. I don't think we can keep having modern society if most of the people do not read.
- piokoch 6y ago
  You don't need to read books to be literate. You can read magazines, newspapers (paper or electronic), if you look on such statistics [1] then, well, numbers are different. Here Poland is on the 3rd place in Europe in terms of time spent on reading - I think this includes not only books, not sure, as this article is a typical XXI century click-bait journalism that does not provide any substantial details about the subject. Besides, the good question is, what is more valuable and mind opening: reading stupid book or watch a good documentary on TV or some scientific channel on YouTube. It is 2021, times has changed, we have more media of idea exchange. Reading books is no longer such a good measure of ones "intellectual development". [1] https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2018/05/chart-of-the-day-where-europeans-read-the-most-and-least/ https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2018/05/chart-of-the-day-wher...
  - coldtea 6y ago
    >You don't need to read books to be literate. You can read magazines, newspapers (paper or electronic) Where, even in the best, you'll find 1/10th the substance you'll find in the best of books, packaged in vacuous snippets for quick consumption, and written to gather advertising... The person who wont read any of the classic books (be it science, non-fiction, literature, history, etc.) but will still read magazines and newspapers, I'll still call illiterate - even if the magazine was the Economist or the National Geographic, and not Men's Health and Cosmopolitan (which more often than not, is).
    - donbrae 6y ago
      Surely being literate is simply being able to read and write coherently? Whether you read books, the Economist, academic papers, Hacker News, or whatever, I don't see how it matters.
aaron695 6y ago
It's great they linked that actual data, to often the media does not do this. And it seems like Canada is exactly the same as the OECD? https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/pub/89-555-x/2013001/t/tbl1.1-eng.htm https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/pub/89-555-x/2013001/t/tbl1.... I don't feel like "Nearly half of adult Canadians struggle with literacy" is justified.
- fouc 6y ago
  51% at level 3: > Texts at this level are often dense or lengthy, and include continuous, non-continuous, mixed, or multiple pages of text. Understanding text and rhetorical structures become more central to successfully completing tasks, especially navigating of complex digital texts. Tasks require the respondent to identify, interpret, or evaluate one or more pieces of information, and often require varying levels of inference. Many tasks require the respondent to construct meaning across larger chunks of text or perform multi-step operations in order to identify and formulate responses. Often tasks also demand that the respondent disregard irrelevant or inappropriate content to answer accurately. Competing information is often present, but it is not more prominent than the correct information. Falling short of level 4: > Tasks at this level often require respondents to perform multiple-step operations to integrate, interpret, or synthesize information from complex or lengthy continuous, non-continuous, mixed, or multiple type texts. Complex inferences and application of background knowledge may be needed to perform successfully. Many tasks require identifying and understanding one or more specific, non-central ideas in the text in order to interpret or evaluate subtle evidence-claim or persuasive discourse relationships. Conditional information is frequently present in tasks at this level and must be taken into consideration by the respondent. Competing information is present and sometimes seemingly as prominent as correct information.
lifeisstillgood 6y ago
Does anyone have examples of the tests used? Reading the description I can see why only 1% are expected to perform at a top level - just interested in the actual
- Someone 6y ago
  Website is at https://www.oecd.org/skills/piaac/ https://www.oecd.org/skills/piaac/ https://www.oecd.org/skills/piaac/piaacdesign/ https://www.oecd.org/skills/piaac/piaacdesign/ has a few sample items.
  - dvh 6y ago
    Right off the bat the very first question is ambiguous. The very first sentence states that children must be there at 9am, but then later says that breakfast is at 7.30. I mean who would give such instructions? Half of the people wants breakfast and other half breakfasts at home.
    - noobermin 6y ago
      That's why they ask for the latest time??? Presumably if some parents cook their kids breakfast and thus would want to bring their kids in later since they would spend some of that time cooking + eating, they can but the kids should be there by the time that the instructions explicitly say should be there? If anything, it is a good test question precisely because it asks for a nuance that could confuse unless the reader actually understands what they read and what question was asked of them.
      - dvh 6y ago
        But this is incorrect answer. The kids had to be there before 7.30 or they will be hungry. Latest time non starving kid can be there is 7.30 not 9am. It is "oh btw classes start at 9 but your kid have to be before 7.30". There are two possible latest times and it really cannot be answered until we know if kid ate or not. Is it possible to bring non fed kid at 9, sure but it's not right. This is poorly stated question for a comprehension test. Because it is not stated whether kid is fed or not, therefore latest possible time is 7.30 KidFed Arrival Outcome True 7.30 Good False 7.30 Good True 9.00 Good False 9.00 Bad 9.00 is only time with possible bad outcome. My point is that it is very poorly specified test and that's causing poor results.
lukeitup 6y ago
I think you need to look at different ways on how we consume information these days. Books, yes, but what about Netflix documentaries, Youtube, Science blogs, etc. We live in a modern informational era, full of opportunities to consume relevant and educational information.
- alpaca128 6y ago
  Yes, it's very dependent on the content. When I read books a lot it was almost 100% novels. Great entertainment value and great to learn reading in a motivating way, but that didn't give me nearly as much inspiration and impulses for thinking critically as useful content on the internet(which is another kind of literacy). Some people enjoy reading great literature and interpreting it, others like it in a different format and that's fine too.
fouc 6y ago
> United States 34.2% of adults scored at Level 3 and 11.5% of adults scored at Level 4/5. Whereas 51% Canadians are at Level 3.
sradman 6y ago
> Poor reading, writing and numeracy skills in adults make up a literacy gap... the gap is due in part to an abundance of jobs in the past that do not require the daily use of reading comprehension and information synthesis skills. The problem is identifying children with learning disabilities and/or low IQ early enough and steering them into effective programs tailored to core literacy/numeracy. This is a non-trivial problem in rural and remote communities. Our disdain of IQ style tests, assumed to be associated with marginalization, has probably backfired. The key question is what level of literacy/numeracy is expected for a given IQ and then identifying individuals that fall below this range of expectations. If you don’t recognize the natural distribution to begin with it is hard to improve outcomes. A second problem not addressed in the article is individuals with above average IQs that are functionally innumerate and lack "information synthesis skills”. Journalists generally fall into this category. We need quality information filters especially during a pandemic.
kodyo 6y ago
Half of Canadians are of below-average intelligence, too. Lower your expectations, guys.
- openfuture 6y ago
  Below median intelligence, for average we don't know.
  - kodyo 6y ago
    The point remains that there are a lot of people who aren't going to find reading or math to be fulfilling intellectual activities.
tandr 6y ago
By reading the description of these tasks on https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/pub/89-555-x/2013001/t/tbl1.1-eng.htm https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/pub/89-555-x/2013001/t/tbl1.... it feels like it is more of a intelligence test then just straight literacy one.
- tandr 6y ago
  *than ...and it probably means I would fail the test...

Yes, noticed that by reading the comments on CBC's site.

andromeduck 6y ago
What comments

> Nearly half of adult Canadians struggle with literacy — and that's bad for the economy Sad that this be couched in monetary terms in order to seem "relevant." As with so many other things, there is a massive qualitative benefit to reading regardless of it's obvious utilitarian or financial advantages.

deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
thundergolfer 6y ago
This persistent kind of framing in media is quite possibly a second order effect of the Neoliberal consensus. Markets become the primary tool of societal organisation, and institutions are bent and dented into an orientation toward the economic value system.
- WalterBright 6y ago
  > Markets become the primary tool of societal organisation Another way to frame that is people buying what they want and people making and selling what other people want. Sounds good to me!
  - atq2119 6y ago
    It's not that that's bad. It's that if everything is viewed only though this particular lens, a wide range of human experience is lost.
    - WalterBright 6y ago
      > a wide range of human experience is lost What is the most important human experience that is lost by markets?
      - helmholtz 6y ago
        85% of all animal life, receding glaciers, acidified, deadened oceans, plastic bag islands the size of Texas, depleted drinking water, dwindling natural resources, global uncontrolled rise of temperature, soil erosion, anti-microbial resistance, pandemics, factory farming animal abuse, forest fires, nuclear waste, asbestos in the lungs, lead in the veins, mercury in the nerves, global obesity... ETA: looks like you edited your comment. The original (and rather tone deaf) comment was: "I'm curious what is lost by people doing what they want to do."
        WalterBright 6y ago
        I edited it to make it easier to answer. Your examples are not examples of a properly set up market system. They are spinning off what are called "externalities", which are costs not born by either the buyer or the seller. A properly set up market would apply those costs to the producer. An example of this is CO2 emission should be taxed, not regulated.
        helmholtz 6y ago
        Ah, indeed, no true scotsman would pollute the planet, don't be daft! We are not blessed to be living in a perfect world that can be set up for an ideal market system. For the last four decades, these externalities have gotten ramped up to fever pitch. I'm interested in your take on how, in this world, we get to a point where ALL of the above consequences can be forestalled through HN's favourite hard-on: deregulation and market forces run amok.
noobermin 6y ago
While that's true, that's just the headline. The article is pretty good, and touches not just on individuals but effects on democracy for example.

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

d3ckard 6y ago

I think the problem is wider. In Poland average Pole doesn't read even one book a year. I don't think we can keep having modern society if most of the people do not read.

piokoch 6y ago
You don't need to read books to be literate. You can read magazines, newspapers (paper or electronic), if you look on such statistics [1] then, well, numbers are different. Here Poland is on the 3rd place in Europe in terms of time spent on reading - I think this includes not only books, not sure, as this article is a typical XXI century click-bait journalism that does not provide any substantial details about the subject. Besides, the good question is, what is more valuable and mind opening: reading stupid book or watch a good documentary on TV or some scientific channel on YouTube. It is 2021, times has changed, we have more media of idea exchange. Reading books is no longer such a good measure of ones "intellectual development". [1] https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2018/05/chart-of-the-day-where-europeans-read-the-most-and-least/ https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2018/05/chart-of-the-day-wher...
- coldtea 6y ago
  >You don't need to read books to be literate. You can read magazines, newspapers (paper or electronic) Where, even in the best, you'll find 1/10th the substance you'll find in the best of books, packaged in vacuous snippets for quick consumption, and written to gather advertising... The person who wont read any of the classic books (be it science, non-fiction, literature, history, etc.) but will still read magazines and newspapers, I'll still call illiterate - even if the magazine was the Economist or the National Geographic, and not Men's Health and Cosmopolitan (which more often than not, is).
  - donbrae 6y ago
    Surely being literate is simply being able to read and write coherently? Whether you read books, the Economist, academic papers, Hacker News, or whatever, I don't see how it matters.

aaron695 6y ago

It's great they linked that actual data, to often the media does not do this. And it seems like Canada is exactly the same as the OECD? https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/pub/89-555-x/2013001/t/tbl1.1-eng.htm https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/pub/89-555-x/2013001/t/tbl1.... I don't feel like "Nearly half of adult Canadians struggle with literacy" is justified.

fouc 6y ago
51% at level 3: > Texts at this level are often dense or lengthy, and include continuous, non-continuous, mixed, or multiple pages of text. Understanding text and rhetorical structures become more central to successfully completing tasks, especially navigating of complex digital texts. Tasks require the respondent to identify, interpret, or evaluate one or more pieces of information, and often require varying levels of inference. Many tasks require the respondent to construct meaning across larger chunks of text or perform multi-step operations in order to identify and formulate responses. Often tasks also demand that the respondent disregard irrelevant or inappropriate content to answer accurately. Competing information is often present, but it is not more prominent than the correct information. Falling short of level 4: > Tasks at this level often require respondents to perform multiple-step operations to integrate, interpret, or synthesize information from complex or lengthy continuous, non-continuous, mixed, or multiple type texts. Complex inferences and application of background knowledge may be needed to perform successfully. Many tasks require identifying and understanding one or more specific, non-central ideas in the text in order to interpret or evaluate subtle evidence-claim or persuasive discourse relationships. Conditional information is frequently present in tasks at this level and must be taken into consideration by the respondent. Competing information is present and sometimes seemingly as prominent as correct information.

lifeisstillgood 6y ago

Does anyone have examples of the tests used? Reading the description I can see why only 1% are expected to perform at a top level - just interested in the actual

Someone 6y ago
Website is at https://www.oecd.org/skills/piaac/ https://www.oecd.org/skills/piaac/ https://www.oecd.org/skills/piaac/piaacdesign/ https://www.oecd.org/skills/piaac/piaacdesign/ has a few sample items.
- dvh 6y ago
  Right off the bat the very first question is ambiguous. The very first sentence states that children must be there at 9am, but then later says that breakfast is at 7.30. I mean who would give such instructions? Half of the people wants breakfast and other half breakfasts at home.
  - noobermin 6y ago
    That's why they ask for the latest time??? Presumably if some parents cook their kids breakfast and thus would want to bring their kids in later since they would spend some of that time cooking + eating, they can but the kids should be there by the time that the instructions explicitly say should be there? If anything, it is a good test question precisely because it asks for a nuance that could confuse unless the reader actually understands what they read and what question was asked of them.
    - dvh 6y ago
      But this is incorrect answer. The kids had to be there before 7.30 or they will be hungry. Latest time non starving kid can be there is 7.30 not 9am. It is "oh btw classes start at 9 but your kid have to be before 7.30". There are two possible latest times and it really cannot be answered until we know if kid ate or not. Is it possible to bring non fed kid at 9, sure but it's not right. This is poorly stated question for a comprehension test. Because it is not stated whether kid is fed or not, therefore latest possible time is 7.30 KidFed Arrival Outcome True 7.30 Good False 7.30 Good True 9.00 Good False 9.00 Bad 9.00 is only time with possible bad outcome. My point is that it is very poorly specified test and that's causing poor results.

lukeitup 6y ago

I think you need to look at different ways on how we consume information these days. Books, yes, but what about Netflix documentaries, Youtube, Science blogs, etc. We live in a modern informational era, full of opportunities to consume relevant and educational information.

alpaca128 6y ago
Yes, it's very dependent on the content. When I read books a lot it was almost 100% novels. Great entertainment value and great to learn reading in a motivating way, but that didn't give me nearly as much inspiration and impulses for thinking critically as useful content on the internet(which is another kind of literacy). Some people enjoy reading great literature and interpreting it, others like it in a different format and that's fine too.

fouc 6y ago

> United States 34.2% of adults scored at Level 3 and 11.5% of adults scored at Level 4/5. Whereas 51% Canadians are at Level 3.

sradman 6y ago

> Poor reading, writing and numeracy skills in adults make up a literacy gap... the gap is due in part to an abundance of jobs in the past that do not require the daily use of reading comprehension and information synthesis skills. The problem is identifying children with learning disabilities and/or low IQ early enough and steering them into effective programs tailored to core literacy/numeracy. This is a non-trivial problem in rural and remote communities. Our disdain of IQ style tests, assumed to be associated with marginalization, has probably backfired. The key question is what level of literacy/numeracy is expected for a given IQ and then identifying individuals that fall below this range of expectations. If you don’t recognize the natural distribution to begin with it is hard to improve outcomes. A second problem not addressed in the article is individuals with above average IQs that are functionally innumerate and lack "information synthesis skills”. Journalists generally fall into this category. We need quality information filters especially during a pandemic.

kodyo 6y ago

Half of Canadians are of below-average intelligence, too. Lower your expectations, guys.

openfuture 6y ago
Below median intelligence, for average we don't know.
- kodyo 6y ago
  The point remains that there are a lot of people who aren't going to find reading or math to be fulfilling intellectual activities.

tandr 6y ago

By reading the description of these tasks on https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/pub/89-555-x/2013001/t/tbl1.1-eng.htm https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/pub/89-555-x/2013001/t/tbl1.... it feels like it is more of a intelligence test then just straight literacy one.

tandr 6y ago
*than ...and it probably means I would fail the test...