What to do with a life's work in literacy? Give it all away
C Dispatch: 2.03.2018 by Jan Swoope
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Jane
Hodges Crater is vivacious, determined, energetic, and sometimes, appalled.
Appalled
that more than 30 million adults in the United States can't read, according to
the U.S. Department of Education and the National Institute of Literacy. It's a
fact the retired educator has spent decades of her life trying to change.
"Did
you know that illiteracy in America is a leading cause of crime, violence and
poverty?" Crater said. "If we could eliminate illiteracy it would
reduce human suffering as well as $18 billion per year it costs to the U.S.
economy."
The
Mississippi University for Women professor emerita of education isn't in the
habit of sitting idly by, and today, on her 80th birthday, she remains as
committed as ever to doing something about it.
Upon
retirement in 1996 from her 25-year university career training teachers for the
classroom, Crater poured her vast expertise into creating "Astronauts to Zippers,"
a complete literacy program that teaches reading, writing, spelling, phonemic
awareness, handwriting and phonics. It can be used by beginning readers of any
age -- young readers, older students having difficulty, former students who did
not finish their education, or adults learning English as a second language.
She
went "on the road" to conferences to market the program, which has
been used extensively in private- and home-schooling curriculums. It consists
of six levels, 144 lessons, teacher manuals, six student workbooks and 72
readers.
And
then what does Crater do? She decided recently to give it all away -- to make
"Astronauts to Zippers" accessible online to anybody who needs it.
"I
wanted to make it available to anyone who wanted to learn to read, any place in
the world, and I wanted it to be free," she said. "I wanted there to
be English literacy for all." READ MORE
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