Best 134 quotes in «literacy quotes» category

About two-thirds of Americans believe that the Bible "answers all or most of the basic questions of life"—and 28 percent of them admit that they rarely or never read it!

A computer does not substitute for judgment any more than a pencil substitutes for literacy. But writing ability without a pencil is no particular advantage.

A hundred years ago, an average teenager knew countless authors, and, a sex position or two. Today, an average teenager knows countless sex positions, and, an author or two.

All over the world there are enormous numbers of smart, even gifted, people who harbor a passion for science. But that passion is unrequited. Surveys suggest that some 95 percent of Americans are “scientifically illiterate.” That’s just the same fraction as those African Americans, almost all of them slaves, who were illiterate just before the Civil War—when severe penalties were in force for anyone who taught a slave to read. Of course there’s a degree of arbitrariness about any determination of illiteracy, whether it applies to language or to science. But anything like 95 percent illiteracy is extremely serious.

All that mankind has done, thought, gained, or been; it is lying as in magic preservation in the pages of books.

America was a land of machines, and it was through machines, the miraculous handmaidens of mob culture, that the muses of illiteracy brought America her voice and vision during the years of the immigrants’ waves. Centuries ago, movable type had given literacy to the common man. Now, through these wondrous newer machines, he would give it back.

(Andrew Johnson couldn't read until he was fourteen! He didn't learn to write until after he was married!)

Any academic skill is quickly achievable if charged with clear purpose and an appeal to enthusiastic self-interest. Tarzan of the Apes only needed about twenty minutes to figure out how to read the beautiful Jane Porter’s cursive writing.

Before Gutenberg, libraries were small -- the Cambridge University library had only 122 volumes in 1424, for instance; after Gutenberg literacy became widespread.

Grammar, n. A system of pitfalls thoughtfully prepared for the feet of the self-made man, along the path by which he advances to distinction.

Civilization begins when everyone eats. Democracy begins when everyone reads.

Defeat winter, read a book.

Dude!" cried Time. "What the fuck, man!" "Sorry," said Cooper. "I thought this was a bathroom." He stuck out a pouty lower lip. "What could possibly have led you to believe this was a bathroom?" the lizard creature hissed. "The door is clearly marked OFFICE!" "I can't read your lizard language," said Cooper.

Every child must be taught how to think, read and write.

Everyone’s talking about the death and disappearance of the book as a format and an object. I don’t think that will happen. I think whatever happens, we have to figure out a way to protect our imaginations. Stories and poetry do that. You need a language in this world. People want words, they want to hear their situation in language, and find a way to talk about it. It allows you to find a language to talk about your own pain. If you give kids a language, they can use it. I think that’s what these educators fear. If you really educate these kids, they aren’t going to punch you in the face, they are going to challenge you with your own language.

For kids who are exposed to books at home, the loss of a library is sad. But for kids who come from environments where people don't read, the loss of a library is a tragedy hat might keep them from ever discovering the joys of reading-or from gathering the kind of information that will decide their lot in life.

Good evening ladies and gentlemen. Eat pudding. Books are good. Eat pudding. If kids read a lot. Eat pudding. They'll get so they can think clearly. Eat pudding. And if enough kids read and think. Eat pudding. We will have world peace. Eat pudding. Thank you very much. Eat pudding.

Growing Literacy of the Heart and Mind Cultivates the Landscape of a Child's Future.

He longed for the little cabin and the sun-kissed sea - for the cool interior of the well-built house, and for the never-ending wonders of the many books.

He switched off the light, came back and sat in the chair. In the darkness, Liesel kept her eyes open. She was watching the words.

Hey there, Hallie, welcome to the next place we need a Deer Crossing sign.' I didn't know that deers could read.' They can in Cosgrove County. It's part of the No Deer Left Behind program.

If literacy was natural, the word ‘illiteracy’ would not exist.

If you read great literature every day, you will uplift your spirit, soul and self.

Illiteracy also means not being able to read or write the words of a language you neither speak nor understand. ~ Nkwachukwu Ogbuagu

Indeed, if these final decades of the millennium have taught us anything, it must be that oral tradition never was the ‘other’ we accused it of being; it never was the primitive, preliminary technology of communication we thought it had to be. Rather, if the whole truth is told, oral tradition stands out as the single most dominant communicative technology of our species, as both a historical fact and, in many areas still, a contemporary reality. The miracle of the flat inscribable surface and Gutenberg’s genius aside, even the electronic revolution cannot challenge the long-term preeminence of the oral tradition. ("Introduction" by John Foley)

I now understood what had been to me a most perplexing difficulty - to wit, the white man's power to enslave the black man. It was a grand achievement, and I prized it highly. From that moment, I understood the pathway from slavery to freedom...The very decided manner with which he spoke, and strove to impress his wife with the evil consequences of giving me instruction, served to convince me that he was deeply sensible of the truths he was uttering. It gave me the best assurance that I might rely with the utmost confidence on the results which, he said, would flow from teaching me to read. What he most dreaded, that I most desired.

...it is very well worth while to be tormented for two or three years of one's life, for the sake of being able to read all the rest of it. Consider - if reading had not been taught, Mrs. Radcliffe would have written in vain - or perhaps might not have written at all.

It’s our(As The Stars of the Sky Foundation, Inc.) passion and joy to read to children and improve literacy, as well as teach others about charity and the impact they can have in a child’s life.

Literacy is a right, not a privilege.

Literacy: Blessing? Or curse?

Literacy makes man a victim of advertising. Education makes him a victim of employment.

...literacy is as vital as food, security, limiting population growth, and control of the environment. Education, after all, is the one issue that affects every other one. I think of it in the same way as dropping a pebble into a pond and getting a ripple effect. Educated people make more money and are more likely to escape poverty. Educated parents raise healthier children. ...The list goes on, just as ripples in a body of water emanate outward.

Literacy is in our veins like blood. It enters every other phrase. It is next to impossible to hold a real conversation, as against an interchange of instructions and acquiescences, in which reference to the printed word is not made or in which the implications of something read do not occur.

Literacy is one of the greatest gifts a person could receive

No one is truly literate who cannot read his own heart.

Parents often ask - how do I get my child interested in books and reading? One tried and true way that my late husband and I used was paying them to read. For each book that my sons read, we paid them $1. They soon developed a love for reading and forgot all about the money. Amazing but true!

People don't gotta like the same stuff. If they did, life would be pretty boring.

Reading, literacy and learning are fundamentally important to establishing strong and stable democracies. Visit your local public library and expand your mind.

Shockingly, too many of our children don't read to grade level. Studies show that if a child does not read to grade level by third grade, that child is likely to drop out of school. I believe the love of reading begins at home. We should do all we can to make sure that our children and grandchildren stay in school and graduate. Reading to grade level is an important foundation.

That's just it, Eva said with a gleam in her eyes that matched the rhinestones on her glasses, you had to get somebody to teach you, to facilitate. Literacy wasn't like a piece of my mama's lemon cake you handed over to somebody on a plate.

The gulf between science and education has been harmful. A look at the science reveals that the methods commonly used to teach children are inconsistent with basic facts about human cognition and development and so make learning to read more difficult than it should be. They inadvertently place many children at risk for reading failure. They discriminate against poorer children who could have become successful readers. Many children who do manage to learn to read under these conditions wind up disinterested in the activity. In short, what happens in classrooms isn't adequate for many children, and this shows in the quality of this country's literacy achievement. Reading is under pressure for other reasons, but educational theories and practices may accelerate its marginalization.

The man who does not read has no advantage over the man who cannot read.

There were lessons later on. These were going a lot better now she’d got rid of the reading books about bouncy balls and dogs called Spot. She’d got Gawain on to the military campaigns of General Tacticus, which were suitably bloodthirsty but, more importantly, considered too difficult for a child. As a result his vocabulary was doubling every week and he could already use words like ‘disembowelled’ in everyday conversation. After all, what was the point of teaching children to be children? They were naturally good at it.

The world of books, the greatest possessions.

To put an arrogant 'famous' writer in his place: pretend to be illiterate.

Want to fix it all? Save the world? Change the system? Ensure progress? Get books into the hands of kids... and your work will be done.

Bookishness, highest literacy, every technique of cultural propaganda and training not only can accompany bestiality and oppression and despotism but at certain points foster it.

African leaders must desire to liberates it’s people through intensive education (formal and informal). The African people deserve to be educated.

Defending the library service from the predations of ideologically-motivated public schoolboys who had immensely privileged childhoods isn’t ‘whining,’ it is the pursuit of passionately held beliefs.

Everyone must be given the opportunity to think, read and write.