Through Target 4.7 of SDG4 on 'quality education', Agenda 2030 invites governments to take ownership of progress towards ensuring 'Education for Sustainable Development' (ESD) becomes embedded into all levels of education. However, conceptual analysis suggests an ongoing blindspot related to the significance of systems literacy in fostering the…

This article deals with problematic fields which influence the level of reading strategies of fifteen to nineteen years old pupils (e.g. selected productive learning activities, work with diverse types of texts and information sources etc.). Moreover, the paper provides information about efficiency testing of pupils in selected reading strategies…

Migrant and seasonal farmworkers are typically Spanish-speaking, Latino immigrants with limited formal education and low literacy skills and, as such, are a vulnerable population. We describe the development of the "Pesticides and Farmworker Health Toolkit", a pesticide safety and health curriculum designed to communicate to farmworkers…

Attainment of functional English literacy skills by all students has been a focus of Australian national policy since the 1989 Hobart Declaration (MCEETYA, 1989). This focus underpins current educational accountability policy enacted through the National Assessment Program-Literacy and Numeracy (NAPLAN). The Adelaide and Melbourne Declarations…

The theoretical background and empirical studies concerned with the relationship between language and cognition in bilingual children and in bilingual mildly retarded children are examined. It is suggested that the effects of bilingualism are not necessarily detrimental to mildly handicapped children. Cognitive and interactional factors in the…

The author suggests that the specification of common literacy demands that are valid on the societal level, that is, which are applicable and meaningful to diverse adults living in diverse environments, is an impossible task. He further suggests that the development of a valid and uniform national curriculum for functional literacy is equally…

Discusses the methodology of designing curricula and transferring knowledge skills, and aptitudes to adult workers.'' (Author)

Describes functional literacy for those interested in office-based occupations. Components of office literacy include computer and cultural literacy, as well as reading skills. Offers six propositions that have implications for office literacy curriculum development. (CH)

In a question-answer interview, a former national project director in Iran highlights some of the achievements in an experimental functional literacy project conducted in an agricultural area and an industrial region of Iran. (AG)

Surveys the five literacy crises that have occurred since the Civil War. Argues that the widespread perception that a serious literacy problem exists in this country today cannot be supported either by international or historical comparisons of achievement. (SRT)

A functional reading program, as distinct from the standard middle school reading program, specifically ensures that all students will acquire the reading skills necessary for survival in our society. Survival reading behaviors to be achieved include the ability to read labels on packages, to locate references in a newspaper, or to translate…

Using practical problems faced by farmers developing new agricultural methods, a problem-oriented approach to adult functional literacy was developed and tested in the Jaipur district. The booklet explains the first two of the project's five phases: exploration, syllabus and curriculum construction, materials preparation, action, and evaluation.…

The document contains papers, working group and discussion reports, and statements by participants of a UNESCO Workshop on the evaluation of functional literacy projects, held at the University of London Institute of Education, August, 1969. The objective of the workshop was to enable people engaged in the evaluation of functional literacy and…

This paper reviews research which indicates that (1) more adults spend more time at job related reading than at any other type of reading; (2) materials written for functional purposes (job manuals, newspapers) are often too difficult for the people who are supposed to read them; (3) secondary English courses focus more on teaching reading and…