Literacy in the 21st Century: Arithmetic, Writing, and Civil Rights

Developed in response to the established and accepted status quo in American society, critical literacy theory proposes that students employ comprehensive reading, writing, thinking, listening, speaking and evaluating skills in an effort to effectively communicate and succeed in everyday, real-life situations. In other words, there is no one path to literacy, and, in order to be a full, functionally literate, and contributing member of society, a number of communication forms must be fluently mastered by individual students.

In his landmark work Radical Equations: Civil Rights from Mississippi to the Algebra Project, former Civil Rights activist Robert Moses presents literacy as a Civil Rights issue. After discussing the deeply visceral experiences he had fighting for Black Voting Rights in the racially stratified south of the 1960s, Moses likens that fight to the current struggle for Black Educational Rights in 21^st century America. In discussing the American political climate of the 60s, Moses writes, “In those days, of course, the issue was the right to vote, and the question was political access” (Moses, 2001, pg. 4). Currently, the fight for equal opportunity in education is very much a Civil Rights issue, and, in many ways, is directly linked to the American Civil Rights movement. Once African Americans were legally recognized as legitimate and ‘equal’ American citizens and the right to vote won, levels of racial hatred and discrimination that were already rampant in this country were by no means lessened. Though it was no longer legal to officially discriminate against a person based on skin color, racial segregation could still be achieved through factors such as the ‘White Flight’ phenomenon, implementation of restricted covenants in affluent neighborhoods, and particularly high tax brackets instilled in top-level school districts.

In what can be construed as an echo of the sentiments of E.D. Hirsch, Moses states “the most urgent social issue affecting poor people and people of color is economic access” (2001, pg. 5). He goes on to say that “the absence of math literacy in urban and rural communities throughout this country is an issue as urgent as the lack of registered Black voters in Mississippi was in 1961” (2001, pg. 5). His solution? The Algebra Project, a national, non-profit organization Moses founded with the specific goal of providing quality education to public school children with a specific focus on mathematical mastery.

Founded in 1982, the Algebra Project makes perfect sense in that it attempts to achieve equality and promote personal success through education and the public school system. Moreover, in his effort to instill educational change, Moses carefully constructed a specific and content driven mathematical curriculum rather than just stopping at a proposal of only “what should be done” to promote positive change. In the almost twenty years since The Project was founded, it has been adopted in over 200 schools and, at least in Chicago, has been aligned to correlate with common core state standards (The Algebra Project, 2011). In this sense, Moses has navigated one of the most difficult aspects of educational reform----adapting a different, more effective curriculum to already instilled district standards. Therein lies the promise of the program. A pitfall comes in not having the program adopted in each and every school district that needs it. In order for an educational initiative to truly work, all those in need must have access to it.

Figure 1. “Inch By Inch” (Smithsonian Institution, 2011)

In “Writing Commonsense Matters,” Linda Rief discusses writing as a pathway to critical literacy, and she argues that “good writing is not defined by one set of criteria but differs depending on the kind of writing” (Rief, 2007, pg. 193). She also calls on educators to provide students with “choice, time, and models of good writing” (2007, pg. 2). Her solution is that students be directly engaged in The Process of Writing in an effort to learn and appreciate the different roles that writing plays in everyday life. Like Moses, Rief has her eye on the prize of having students become more well rounded and comprehensive in their academic abilities, a skill which will ultimately serve them well in society as a whole.   

In “Making It Matter Through the Power of Inquiry” and “Effective Teachers, Effective Instruction,” Wilhelm, Smith, and Allington collectively call for teachers to be trained and allowed to work in a manner that actually fosters, rather than crushes, student intellect and literacy ability. Wilhelm and Smith talk about the necessity of intellectual “flow” in a class and primarily focus on the education of boys in the classroom, while Allington talks about the dynamic of an effective teacher’s classroom. All three authors present an argument that primarily showcases ways in which teachers can ideally be trained to be consummate and accomplished educators. In a nod to Deborah Dean’s genre theory (the theory that children must be taught according to the values of many different types of writing), Wilhelm, Smith, and Allington ask that teachers “expand notions of text and curriculum and what counts as meaningful reading and learning” (Wilhelm and Smith, 2007, pg. 236). If all American public school teachers can adhere to this teaching approach and foster the varied writing and literacy skills of children, the academic skills of countless students across the nation would skyrocket. However, the pitfalls of such a literacy proposal lies in having each and every public school teacher properly trained according to a more Genre Theory related academic approach.

While all the readings of this week talked about teaching methods that would ultimately improve the academic and intellectual skills of U.S. citizens, the pitfalls lie in the ways such teaching approaches could be nationally implemented.