tozer article

Throughout this article Tozer focused on four contemporary perspectives on literacy; cultural, conventional, functional, and critical. Many theorist were brought into the article to disclaim the other theories leaving the reader to decipher for themselves the importance of each category. Although the author had an increase of complaints against functional literacy I feel that this is the most important faucet of literacy for school-age children. The other forms of literacy are not important to survive in today’s society. With a constant increase of ESL (English as a second language) students into our school system, the need to be critically literate seems light years away. In order for a capitalist society to exist we need to have a stratified system of workers. To assume that al of our society needs to be worldly literate in order to survive is ridiculous. This view may sound cynical in terms of an educated world, but to me it is realistic. These “uncultured” workers are vital to make this country run smoothly. As an educator you need to be focusing on teaching intermediate literacy skills so that a student is educated enough to make one of two choices. Take that information and expand it in college or use the information to make a living for themselves. I do agree that a more educated world is a better world, however this is an unrealistic goal for today’s society