THE READING GAP Documentary ▬ John Corcoran Foundation

THE READING GAP

@JCFliteracy

John Corcoran Foundation: 1.17.2021

An Open Letter From John Corcoran

My years of passion and advocacy for literacy have great meaning to me. After all these years, I still can't stop advocating and working to change things so other little boys and little girls don't suffer unnecessarily like I did.

Recently I've been involved in planning for this literacy documentary that will include my story.  Having 65% of 4th graders in the US lacking proficiency in literacy is a national shame. We have a superstar line up of experts to interview, tasked with outlining the problem and solution. Educators who have shown the kinds of gains that are possible and former/current struggling readers have committed to participate too. This monumental project has the potential to change the face of literacy in our country and beyond!

We are currently working to raise funds for this film and, along with your moral support, would appreciate any donation to the project if you feel moved to do so. Your enthusiasm, energy, and willingness to help us spread the word about his film would also be greatly appreciated! Together, we can make a significant difference.

Here is a 1 minute video that will give you a glimpse of the work of Nick Nanton, the film's superstar Emmy award winning director and producer.  WATCH 03:37

Automatic Readability Checker

Based on 7 readability formulas:

Grade Level: 11

Reading Level: fairly difficult to read.

Reader's Age: 15-17 yrs. old

(Tenth to Eleventh graders)

 

Lessons from the Teacher Who Couldn’t Read ▬ Literacy For All

Lessons from the Teacher Who Couldn’t Read

John Corcoran
Foundation

Literacy For All: 1.14.2021 with Jose L Cruz, The San Diego Council on Literacy

In this show, we hear from John Corcoran, “the teacher who couldn’t read”. We hear his story and get a great sense about the passion that, for over five decades, has driven his efforts for greater literacy. John speaks about his campaign for effective, evidence-based literacy instruction and the need to make system-based changes that will result in many more children learning to read. John is currently working with award-winning director, Nick Nanton, to produce a new literacy documentary.  LISTEN 27:53

How Learning To Read At 54 Transformed My Life ▬ BBC

Lockdown Win: How Learning To Read At 54 Transformed My Life

@ReadEasyUK

BBC: 1.24.2021

Tim Davies was one of millions of adults in England who struggled to read and write. For a long time he tried to hide this fact, but a brush with cancer caused him to re-evaluate his life and not even lockdown could stop his progress.

Previously shopping or dealing with bills was a daunting task, he said.

Now Tim, 54, is learning to drive and hopes to start his own business as a tree surgeon.

"It's changed my life," he said.

About seven million adults in England have very poor literacy skills, the Literacy Trust charity estimates.

Tim said his problems began as a nine-year-old when he was left at a boys' home.

"From that point I thought nobody cared about me so why should I care?

"So I never concentrated at school."

Tim, who lives in Bristol, said he managed to cope with life by hiding his skills gap and took a job as a tree surgeon and landscape gardener because it did not require him to read.

"I was scared to tell people. I kept it quiet."

If you know someone who needs help

John Corcoran set up a foundation in his name to help adults and children with literacy skills - in California and online

In the UK, the National Literacy Trust website lists organisations that promote adult literacy

These include Read Easy and the Reading Agency

READ MORE ➤➤

Automatic Readability Checker

Based on 7 readability formulas:

Grade Level: 8

Reading Level: fairly easy to read.

Reader's Age: 12-14 yrs. old

(Seventh and Eighth graders)

The Teacher Who Couldn't Read ▬ Nick Nanton Will Direct Film on Lack of Literacy in America

Nick Nanton Set to Direct Upcoming Feature Film on Lack of Literacy in America

The Teacher
Who Couldn't Read

PR Newswire: 11.13.2020 by DNA Films

® Award-winning Director Nick Nanton has signed on to direct a new documentary feature film from DNA Films® in partnership with the John Corcoran Foundation™ that aims to change the conversation around literacy through highlighting illiteracy, sub-literacy, and learning disabilities, including dyslexia.

Only 35% of 4th graders are proficient in reading nationally, but the John Corcoran Foundation believes that 95-100% of all students can become proficient in reading, writing, and spelling and that the brain can be changed with proper instruction.

The prevalence of illiteracy and sub-literacy in America stems from antiquated, ineffective methodologies still being used in teacher colleges leading to ineffective student instruction in schools. These foundational problems exacerbate and perpetuate student failure and highlight the fact that the Science of Reading is not driving how teachers are prepared or how kids are taught.

While reading is a simple pleasure for 35% of society, for the majority of people--both young and old-- reading, writing, and spelling is often a shame-based struggle that learners work diligently to hide from the outside world, resulting in a handicap that's invisible to society.

This documentary will feature personal stories from people who have struggled with illiteracy or sub-literacy, including John Corcoran, who is widely known as "The Teacher Who Couldn't Read."

Corcoran's story is astonishing in part because he successfully hid his inability to read for decades – graduating high school, then college, and then worked as a high school teacher – and it grew even more astonishing as he eventually revealed his shame-based secret at 48, learned to read, and has since dedicated his life to helping resolve America's illiteracy and sub-literacy epidemic.

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The as-yet-to-be-titled film is set to begin principal photography in early 2021. This film will also provide a roadmap for educators to show that there is a better way to instruct students how to read, one that the overwhelming majority of teachers currently are not taught in college or in district professional development.  READ MORE ➤➤

Automatic Readability Checker

Based on 7 readability formulas:

Grade Level: 18

Reading Level: very difficult to read.

Reader's Age: College graduate

Literacy – Spanning the US :: Birmingham AL :: Cadillac MI :: Wichita Falls TX

Literacy: Spanning the U.S.     

@literacy_update

At 88, Fred Oliver Spends Several Hours Per Week To Become A Better Reader

Birmingham Times: 6.21.2018 by Anita Debro

At age 88, Fred Oliver is learning how to read better, so he spends several hours a week of his retirement years at The Literacy Council (TLC) of Central Alabama.

“I want to be able to read better than I already do,” he said.

When Oliver starts telling a story, he sits up just a little bit straighter in his chair as he speaks. His eyes, turned a watery blue from 88 years of seeing, focus on some memory invisible to the listener.

He recounts the day the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor: he was a young man sitting in church, where his adoptive father was preaching, and the police came into the church and warned about the attack. He recalls the time he met Jackie Robinson: he was having breakfast in a Connecticut hotel and the baseball legend walked right over to him. He recollects when he saw James Brown at the Apollo Theater in Harlem.

While sharing stories about the many things he’s seen and places he’s lived—he spent most of his adult years in New Jersey—Oliver also reveals that he quit school at an early age to work after his adoptive father died, so he never really learned how to read.

He did, however, learn a lot of on-the-job skills. At the City Ice Co., formerly located on Birmingham’s Southside, he learned how to haul ice and earned $21 a week doing so. At a local slaughterhouse, he learned how to skin cattle, debone hams, and cure bacon, earning $100 a week. At a New Jersey bread bakery, he learned how to drive a tractor trailer, repair cars, and do just about every other job at the company.

Asked how he was able to learn so many demanding jobs without knowing how to read, Oliver just shrugs: “It was just in me. I could read well enough.”  READ  MORE >>

Cadillac Area ALC

Volunteer says giving back is part of her social justice responsibility

Animal lover works to prevent cruelty to animals and teaches English to the migrant community

Cadillac News: 6.26.2018 by Mardi Suhs

Kathy Kirch loves animals, traveling and living in Spain, gardening, and helping migrant workers become adept at English.

Those are just a few of the passions that fill her busy life since the former director of the Cadillac-Wexford Public Library retired.

"I loved my job," she said. "I also love retirement. It allows me to travel to see my brothers and sisters in California."

Kirch began her career teaching English in Spain and fell in love with the country. She made her home in Barcelona from 1973 to 1984 and became familiar with the country, its music, food and wine. Now she returns once or twice a year for an extended stay.

When she's not traveling, she volunteers with the Adult Literacy Council of the Friends of the Cadillac-Wexford Public Library and with the Wonderland Humane Society.

With the literacy program, she tutors the migrant community, those working in the Christmas tree industry and on dairy farms.

"The kids know English, but the adults don't," she said. "It's to get people set up and feeling comfortable. I feel by the grace of God I had the chance to learn Spanish. Now it's time for me to give back. I see it as part of my social justice responsibility in this world. It's my reward to see them able to get on better in the community."  READ MORE >>

WALC

Those struggling to read find crafty ways to deceive, cope

Wichita Falls Times Record News: 6.27.2018 by Sara Shelton, Exec Director-WALC

Please help us.  Read on. You can make a huge difference! We need you.

“You’re 10 years old, sitting at a small wooden desk, praying the teacher won’t call on you. She turns toward you and says, ‘Johnny, read the first sentence on page two.’

Fear immediately seizes you as you stare down at the garbled mix of symbols on the page. They’re not familiar friends; they are strangers who glare at you with cryptic stares. They mock you.

Your inability to speak their language sends you to the dummy row. But despite the fact that you can’t comprehend how to put letters together or unravel their code, you are sent on to fifth grade. And sixth. And seventh. You receive your high school diploma, but you can’t read a word of it.

To survive in the world of literates, you become an expert at deception, relying on clever schemes to make up for your disability. You go to college. And when you graduate, you move from the dummy row in the back of the class to the head of the class…..you become a teacher!” (The Teacher Who Couldn’t Read by John Corcoran).

How can this happen?  He could not read or write but became a high school teacher? This is a similar story we hear often at the literacy council office. There is a common belief that people who can't read or write have a low IQ; however, this is usually not the case.

They have developed skills to get through life while hiding their secret, and hiding illiteracy isn't for dummies. You've got to be pretty sharp to get other people to do things for you without them knowing why or asking questions.

Mr. Corcoran has a learning disability that we see frequently at Wichita Adult Literacy Council (WALC).  Some are diagnosed but many are not.  READ MORE >>

John Corcoran :: ‘I Was a Teacher for 17 Years, But I Couldn’t Read or Write’ via BBC

‘I was a teacher for 17 years, but I couldn’t read or write’

BBC News: 4.15.2018 by Sarah McDermott   LISTEN

The Teacher

Who Couldn’t Read

John Corcoran grew up in New Mexico in the US during the 1940s and 50s. One of six siblings, he graduated from high school, went on to university, and became a teacher in the 1960s - a job he held for 17 years. But, as he explains here, he hid an extraordinary secret.

When I was a child I was told by my parents that I was a winner, and for the first six years of my life I believed what my parents had told me.

I was late in talking, but I went off to school with high hopes of learning to read like my sisters, and for the first year things were fine because there weren't many demands on us other than standing in the right line, sitting down, keeping our mouths shut and going to the bathroom on time.

And then in the second grade we were supposed to learn to read. But for me it was like opening a Chinese newspaper and looking at it - I didn't understand what those lines were, and as a child of six, seven, eight years old I didn't know how to articulate the problem.

I remember praying at night and saying, "Please Lord, let me know how to read tomorrow when I get up" and sometimes I'd even turn on the light and get a book and look at it and see if I got a miracle. But I didn't get that miracle.

At school I ended up in the dumb row with a bunch of other kids who were having a hard time learning to read. I didn't know how I got there, I didn't know how to get out and I certainly didn't know what question to ask.

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@JohnCorcoranFDN

I taught high school from 1961 to 1978. Eight years after I quit my teaching job, something finally changed.

I was 47 going on 48 when I saw Barbara Bush - then Second Lady of the US - talking about adult literacy on TV. It was her special cause. I'd never heard anybody talking about adult literacy before, I thought I was the only person in the world that was in the situation I was in.

I was at this desperate spot in my life. I wanted to tell somebody and I wanted to get help and one day in the grocery store I was standing in line and there were two women in front of me talking about their adult brother who was going to the library. He was learning to read and they were just full of joy and I couldn't believe it.

So one Friday afternoon in my pinstriped suit I walked into the library and asked to see the director of the literacy programme and I sat down with her and I told her I couldn't read.

That was the second person in my adult life that I had ever told.  READ MORE >>

Once Illiterate, Teacher Now Inspires Others

Once Illiterate, Teacher Now Inspires Others

The Pilot: 3.10.2015 by John Lentz

A successful businessman and former teacher who hid his inability to read will tell his story next month at a Literacy Council fundraiser.

When Moore County Literacy Council Executive Director Beth Daniels began searching for speakers to participate in a fundraising dinner for her organization, she was impressed by the story of John Corcoran, of San Diego. Corcoran is a former business leader and English teacher for 17 years who, incredibly, hid his inability to read and write for decades before "guilt" drove him to begin literacy classes.

"I was looking for an adult who was on the same path as many of our learners, and Mr. Corcoran's story really stood out," said Daniels. "Society has made illiteracy a shameful thing, which is really sad because it inhibits people from coming forward for help. We have adults taking instruction from us today who have sworn us to secrecy because their family members don't know that they are unable to read."

The Moore County Literacy Council will host Corcoran for a fundraising dinner on April 16 at 6 p.m. at the Pinehurst Member's Club.

"I was illiterate for most of my life," said Corcoran, now 77. "I was one of those people who, in the second grade, ended up in the dumb row. I could not read, write or spell."  READ MORE !

Teach Reading Without Using Labels

Teach reading without using labels
Sign On San Diego: 6.10.11 by John Corcoran

“Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me.” As children, we were taught those words. But as adults, we know that words and labels can and do hurt. One such label is “learning disability.”

Like the thorn in the lion’s paw, which others cannot see but the lion feels sharply, the pain caused by being labeled “learning disabled” cannot be discounted. Others may say the label is harmless, or that it is meant to be helpful in the allocation of educational resources. But that label, often given in childhood, can cause pain and shame into adulthood.

Coined in 1963 by Samuel Kirk, who was then a professor of special education at the University of Illinois, the term was first suggested to concerned parents as a means of describing “their children who had disorders in development of language, speech, reading and associated communication skills.”

Before the 1960s, terms that had been used by the medical and education community to describe these children included “brain damaged,” “minimal brain dysfunction,” “mentally retarded” and “emotionally disturbed.” Many parents embraced “learning disabled,” swallowing the psychological placebo in hopes it would make everything all better. But it has not.

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So what term should we use? How about “Susie” or “Jimmy”? Call each learner, child or adult by his or her name. Then identify their individual challenges with reading through diagnostic testing. Based on the results, prescribe the evidence-based treatment.

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It’s time to stop looking at learners with difficulties as disabled. They are “learning able.” I know because of my personal experience. If I had been in elementary school in the early 1960s, I would have been branded with that new label of “learning disabled.” Instead, when I was a little boy growing up in the 1940s, I was put in the “dumb row” because I was among the many children who had difficulties learning how to read and write.

The term “dumb” stuck with me until I learned to read at the age of 48. Finally, as an adult, I found a teacher who knew how to teach me. She gave me a battery of tests that diagnosed my difficulties (a severe auditory discrimination problem was the main one) and recommended proper treatment and instruction based on the findings. Never was I considered learning disabled by that teacher. She believed I was able to read with proper instruction.

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The way forward is clear. We have the research and the science to teach all learners. This is the level playing field that produces equal opportunity for all. Let’s do away with the labels and see each other for who we truly are: learning able. READ MORE !

Corcoran is a literacy advocate and author of “Bridge to Literacy: No Child – or Adult – Left Behind” and his autobiography, “The Teacher Who Couldn’t Read.” He has served on the National Institute for Literacy.

John Corcoran: The Teacher Who Couldn't Read

It is never too late to learn how to read.

Watch John Corcoran share his story live on-stage at The Moth !

Over the last 20 years, John has had the opportunity to speak to millions of people as a literacy advocate. In New York, however, he had the unique experience of sharing his life story in an artistic venue from a first person point of view, to an audience of theater-goers.

Part 1: Introduction through high school.

Part 2: Life at college.

Part 3: High School teacher.

"I'm a university graduate," I began, "with a bachelor's degree in education and business administration and over 90 additional graduate units. I attended school for 35 years, half of them as a professional educator. In acquiring these experiences, I could not read a textbook or write the answer to an essay question. This is the first public acknowledgment that I have ever made, that I have been a functional illiterate for almost 50 years.”

– John Corcoran, October 1987