New literacy test seeks to improve skills
Belize’s literacy rate has always been the subject of public discussion, initially due to its traditional high level, above ninety percent, and more recently due to its gradual decline to somewhere in the low 70’s. Today I sat in on one effort that seeks to measure–and improve–the literacy skills of Belizean students.
Janelle Chanona, Reporting
This morning, fifty students from Anglican schools in Belize City participated in a pilot programme designed to test their literacy skills.
Carol Babb, General Manager, Anglican Schools
“There was this complaint over and over that our children are not reading the way they should and we were just guessing what the problems were, so we have put together this test.”
According to Carol Babb, General Manager for Anglican Schools in Belize, the exam includes sections that deal with phonics, blends, comprehension and identification of words.
Carol Babb
“What I have observed is that the children are doing an excellent job of initial sounds, they can look at “A” and say “ah”, they can look at “B” and say “bu”, but I have noticed that not many of them are able to, at this point–and I have only seen two of them–put the sound blends together.”
“This test will help us to determine what are the strengths of our children in terms of reading, their weaknesses, and what we need to do to bring them up to the expected level.”
Janelle Chanona
“What are you going to do with the information you get today?”
Carol Babb
“The information we get today, this is the piloting as I said earlier, we will look at the test to see if some of the items were too difficult or too easy, we will take them out and put in more appropriate words and then this final test will be administered to every infant one child in the Anglican schools.”
The Ministry of Education does conduct similar testing at government run schools for students in Standard Three, but the experts agree, when it comes to correcting literacy problems, the sooner the better.
Beth Weir, Teacher
“The best thing is to talk to your children, and just explore the world with them so that what you are teaching them is vocabulary, and sounds so they can hear those sounds. As far as, possible you should read to children, any kind of poems, songs, those kinds of things are extraordinary. Any kind of family stories that are passed down from generation to generation you should tell those. So if you do all those things, you are going to have a child ready to learn to read when he or she comes to school.”
