Facts About Children's Literacy

Below are a few facts that I discovered about children's literacy.

Sources: NEA, International Reading Association, U.S. Dept. of Education

*More than half of young people say that their parents do not encourage them to read other than for school work.

*Children who report that their parents encourage them to read are more likely to read a high volume of books (65% read more than 10 per year).

*More than a third of young people report that they read more in their spare time than their parents.

*Communities ranking high in achievement tests have several factors in common: an abundance of books in public libraries, easy access to books in the community at large and a large number of text books per pupil.

*The National Center for Education Statistics found that nearly two-thirds of the low-income families they studied owned no books for children.

*In two-thirds of U.S. classrooms, there are fewer than 50 children's books.