How We Have Fallen Short in Teaching Literacy — And

This May Be Difficult to Read by Claire Rubman

This may be difficult to read, but did you know:

• In the last 15 years, 15 million students graduated from high schools testing below the basic reading level.
• One in five college students enroll in remedial reading classes in their freshman year.
• More than 42 million Americans are functionally illiterate; they can’t follow the directions on a can of soup.

Now, a cognitive developmental psychologist with more than 30 years in the classroom has scoured the research, made her own professional observations and notes from personal experience, and put together a fascinating book that takes aim at what’s wrong with the learning process – reading in particular – and has set out to offer solutions.

The book certainly has an appropriate title: This May Be Difficult to Read. Within it, the author, Dr. Claire Rubman, breaks down myths about reading, separates fact from fiction, and works to get parents and educators on the right course. Choosing the right strategy for children to read, Rubman believes, is “the most politicized topic in the field of education.”

“I’ve watched my children succeed and fail with phonics, reading, reading comprehension, and learning,” she says.  “I’ve seen our collective children hurting, and I’ve also seen them succeed beyond their wildest dreams. I have such a passion for watching them develop a love for reading and learning that I wanted to share it with parents, educators and anyone else concerned with helping our children read.”

Dr. Rubman hopes this book will serve as a catalyst for change that will disrupt early childhood education so that children of all ages and backgrounds will fall in love with reading. This, in turn, will allow children to learn to use the printed word to think, grow, and challenge the status quo.

This book is designed to alleviate some of the frustration we often experience when trying to teach our children. The book looks at the learning process through a child’s eyes to more fully appreciate how children think, learn, and process information within the context of learning to read and comprehend the written word.

To that end, Dr. Rubman offers solutions to combat reading comprehension failure, perhaps foremost the task of transforming one’s home so that reading becomes as natural as speaking. Parents must create a “need to read’ in their homes and make learning a byproduct of fun.

Dr. Rubman’s writing style is both scholarly and relatable. She knows her stuff, is quite thorough, and supplements her learning points with personal examples of the how and why, often using her own family as her “characters.” She takes a complex topic and makes it user-friendly and readable so that it can be processed by a larger audience than just literacy professionals and learned parents.

“I have watched some students struggle badly,” says Dr. Rubman. “These are clearly highly verbal students, but their reading comprehension skills sell them short in the classroom.”

“Will your child be one of the success stories or struggle with textbooks and comprehending the printed word? This book is about inspiring the greatest number of children to love reading and the comprehension process so that they can’t wait to pick up a book.”

Learn more at https://difficulttoread.com.

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