Name: Piper Curda

General Purpose: To convince

Specific Purpose Statement: To convince the audience that schools should take the matter of
learning to read and subsequent illiteracy due to lack thereof more seriously.

Introduction
I. Attention Getter: [THIS CLIP WILL PLAY FROM 2:30-3:17:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=quXNZib3H0s] This is a clip from the movie
Primary Colors starring John Travolta and Emma Thompson and, ultimately, the
movie itself doesn’t have much to do with illiteracy. However, this scene, wherein an
adult man named Dewayne is speaking to Travolta’s character, Governor Jack
Stanton, is extremely representative of the issues we face in America today regarding
illiteracy. Dewayne claims he couldn’t read until he started attending classes as an
adult. He says, “They just kept passing me up.” In this case, ‘they’ is referring to the
teachers in his elementary school classes. This is the sad reality in many cases at
public schools around the country. Children who can’t read simply aren’t given the
attention they need in order to learn. While all of us in here are lucky enough to know
how to read and to have received the assistance we needed in learning how to, many
students go their entire academic career without having that privilege.

II. Relevance Statement: The students of today hold the power to determine the quality
of tomorrow. If the future leaders of our country cannot read above a third-grade
level, our country will be impacted economically, communally, the workforce will
suffer, and the line of illiteracy will continue. These are some of the few threats we
face due to illiteracy. Just because we can read and maybe we didn’t have much to do
with the fact that others can’t, students’ inability to read heavily impacts the world
around us in a number of negative ways. We can avoid the blame for why people are
illiterate, but we cannot avoid the affects it has on our own lives.

III. Credibility Statement: According to some research like that conducted by the
National Right to Read Foundation and Rasmussen College, illiteracy among students
is very heavily contributed to by public schools and their lack of effective ways to
teach students how to read.

IV. Thesis Statement: The public schools in America need to put more of an emphasis
on the importance of reading and implement strategies in the classroom to promote
higher literacy levels.

Directional Transition: There are about 319 million people in the U.S. and of those people,
about 20% of them can’t read. This goes on to affect the economy, the workforce, and even the
health of the rest of America.
 Body
I. Illiteracy is a problem in the United States that starts in the public school system and that
needs fixing.
A. Illiteracy affects everyone.
i. Illiteracy affects those that are illiterate by subjecting them to lower wages,
higher unemployment, low self-esteem, lower-quality jobs, and the possibility of
intergenerational transmission of illiteracy (Consequences of illiteracy).
ii. Illiteracy has a direct impact on the health of those that are unable to read
(ILLITERACY…, 2008)
iii. Illiteracy affects those that are literate by “lowering the level of community
involvement and civic participation” (Consequences of illiteracy) and costing
taxpayers over $200 billion a year.
B. The public schools are where the problem starts
i. Public schools stopped teaching phonics in school in the 1930s and switched to
the “look and say” method, which studies have shown to be much less effective
(Sweet)
ii. Many schools dismiss students that are doing poorly due to illiteracy as
students that are lazy or who have behavioral issues and write them off as such
instead of helping them.

Directional Transition: Illiteracy is not mutually exclusive with the quality of society. It is an
issue that needs to be addressed in order to ensure a positive future for our country, and we can
start by addressing the way reading is taught and promoted in public schools.

II. Illiteracy can be fixed through reintroducing phonics into elementary curriculum and
enforcing the importance of reading in the critical years of a child’s literacy formation.
A. The phonics method of teaching kids how to read is the most effective and crucial in
raising literacy levels.
i. “If children are taught intensive, systematic phonics at an early age, until it is
automatically applied in the reading process, then illiteracy is dramatically
reduced, comprehension improves, and remediation is virtually unnecessary,
except for very few” (Sweet).
ii. The “look and say” method causes children to rely too heavily on picture-word
association instead of learning letter patterns and structures (Phyllis, 1996)
B. Reading needs to be more of a priority in the public schools
i. Reading proficiency checkpoints/tests should be distributed often and reviewed
carefully during the formative years of a child’s literacy (first through third grade)
in order to see how well children are reading and be able to recognize and
subsequently help those that are struggling.
ii. Create more opportunities in the classroom that promote literacy. Field trips,
interactive story time, and playing with the children are all activities that aid a
child’s literacy development (Bird).

Directional Transition: It won’t change overnight, but it doesn’t take a whole lot in order to at
least begin to aid the issue of illiteracy in the U.S. If we are able to do so, we are guaranteeing a
more promising future for us and the country we live in.
III. Fixing the illiteracy problem in public schools allows for a brighter future for everyone in
America.
A. America will benefit economically from a decrease in illiteracy.
i. Following a decrease in illiteracy, less taxpayer money will go towards aiding
the issue and can go towards other causes.
ii. “A literate workforce attracts more business resulting in higher salaries,
enhanced job security, greater productivity, increased consumer spending and tax
revenues, reduced correctional costs, and a decreased drain on social services”
(Heavenridge, 2015).
B. If illiteracy is not addressed, America faces a grim future.
i. Illiteracy contributes to the prison population as well as the gang population and
will continue to do so if it is not fixed.
ii. Illiteracy is a generational trait and will be passed on for years to come if the
problem is not aided.

Conclusion

I. Restatement of Thesis: Illiteracy is not a problem that can be fixed quickly and it won’t
be a problem we solve overnight, however, it starts and can end in the public schools. If
the public schools put more emphasis on the importance of reading in their classrooms,
illiteracy can begin to become less of a problem our nation faces.

II. Clincher: By show of hands, who here knows how to read? All of your hands are raised.
First two rows, put your hands down. In some classrooms around the country, only this
many hands can be raised in answer to that question. The rest of you, put your hands
down. If we continue to let illiteracy in the U.S. go unnoticed and untreated, this could be
the reality—we say ‘raise your hand if you can read’ and no hands go up.
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