I found this podcast from this 
post:
I subbed today for a 7th and 8th grade teacher. I’m not exaggerating when I say at least 50% of the students were at a 2nd grade reading level. The students were to spend the class time filling out an “all about me” worksheet, what’s your name, favorite color, favorite food etc. I was asked 20 times today “what is this word?”. Movie. Excited. Trait. “How do I spell race car driver?”
I've only listened to one episode so far, but it's really well produced, seems well-researched and very well put together.
From what I gather so far, the ways that the American public school system "teaches" kids how to read is not only completely wrong, but actually saddles them bad habits which fundamentally hinder their reading comprehension.
A huge swath of American adults are functionally illiterate, and I think I'm starting to understand why.
A lot of people are commenting about how, so what, lots of people can read and are also stupid. Except this isn't about being stupid. Or dumb. Reading and writing is a skill you gotta be tutored into. You won't learn it through intuition. You won't learn it through osmosis, guesswork or because the Holy Ghost descended from the heavens to enlighten your soul. You have to be taught, step by step, how to decode writing in order to then develop it into other skills, like different levels of reading, making annotations, making summaries, prose writing, and so on. All of these things should ideally become second nature to you through a long process of 'scholarization', one that is formulated with full understanding of what kids of different ages tend to need, and what kids in particular may require of their teachers.
Think about it. This isn't like zoomers being unable to use Windows because they have phones. It's like not having a school system in the first place. Good god, the districts that keep this scam pedagogy in place are gonna create a lost generation.
also illiteracy is a humiliating thing to admit to in our society and it isn't rich kids not being taught to read. mocking illiteracy is classism
in this case it's also rich kids. teachers/schools bought into the hype at all levels despite governments telling them no stop. the difference is the rich kids can afford private tutors when their parents realize they can't read.
So in other words it's not really also rich kids
what I mean is that rich school districts were also using this method. there's a bit in the podcast where rich parents in one of the wealthiest neighborhoods in the US were going to the library to ask where they could get materials to teach their kids how to read.
Yeah my MIL used to be a public school teacher in a district that no one would ever call poor. Not the richest, but definitely not poor. For the last several years of her career all I ever heard from her was along the lines of "what the fuck am I supposed to be doing again? I have a room full of 9th graders who can't read." No idea what method they were using in the earlier grades, but well off suburban districts are definitely pumping out illiterate kids as well.
There probably is a reasonable argument to be made about it being very difficult to make reasonable democratic decisions if a person can't read and therefore can't seek information and views outside their immediate social circle.
Of course, also not surprising that some people would interpret that as "Afghans stupid."
Literacy is a communist conspiracy
MILLENNIA of funny SQUIGGLES on stone tablets, papyrus, and PAPER
There are only THREE sounds in the word "EIGHT", why are there FIVE letters???
They have played us for FOOLS
You don't? I taught myself how to read. How would you call that?
i would call that "I taught myself how to lie".
Depends. If we mean "without a personal teacher" sure, but no one is looking at a book of a language the don't know and just suddenly learning it.
How did you do it? What resources did you have, and how old were you?
you've used the word taught, which implies reasoning. which is by definition not intuitive. reading was never innate to you or anyone else.