Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface
- 1 Domains, questions, and directions
- 2 Language and literacy in Morocco
- 3 The cultural context of schooling
- 4 Doing fieldwork in Morocco
- 5 Learning to read in Arabic
- 6 Social factors in literacy acquisition
- 7 Beliefs and literacy
- 8 Learning to read in a second language and a second literacy
- 9 Functional literacy: School learning and everyday skills
- 10 School dropout and literacy retention: Out of school, out of mind?
- 11 Literacy and poverty
- 12 Linking research and policy
- 13 Literacy, culture, and development: Concluding thoughts about a changing society
- Appendix 1 Cognitive consequences of Quranic preschooling
- Appendix 2 Details of test construction
- Appendix 3 Parent interview
- Appendix 4 Student interview
- References
- Name index
- Subject index
- Plate section
10 - School dropout and literacy retention: Out of school, out of mind?
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 16 October 2009
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface
- 1 Domains, questions, and directions
- 2 Language and literacy in Morocco
- 3 The cultural context of schooling
- 4 Doing fieldwork in Morocco
- 5 Learning to read in Arabic
- 6 Social factors in literacy acquisition
- 7 Beliefs and literacy
- 8 Learning to read in a second language and a second literacy
- 9 Functional literacy: School learning and everyday skills
- 10 School dropout and literacy retention: Out of school, out of mind?
- 11 Literacy and poverty
- 12 Linking research and policy
- 13 Literacy, culture, and development: Concluding thoughts about a changing society
- Appendix 1 Cognitive consequences of Quranic preschooling
- Appendix 2 Details of test construction
- Appendix 3 Parent interview
- Appendix 4 Student interview
- References
- Name index
- Subject index
- Plate section
Summary
Amina has to drop out of school
Four years after she finished her first year of school in al-Ksour, Amina Tamandat found herself in an unenviable situation. Her two older brothers were in collegè (middle school), and her mother had recently had her fourth child, a baby girl. Amina, unlike some of her classmates, did not have a large number of aunts and female cousins living nearby. Her brothers couldn't help, as they were studying hard and doing part-time work with her father.
Who, then, would help her mother tend the baby, make meals for other extended family members, and generally help around the house? It is an old and familiar story in al-Ksour – and, indeed, across the Third World. Amina had to quit her studies, even though her grades were well above average. She would soon become one of the majority of youth in al-Ksour who drop out of school.
A literacy retention study would seem to be an anomaly. If one learns to read and write, can't we assume that these skills will be retained? As noted in chapter 1, it is not unusual for writers and scholars to say that the world is divided into the haves and have-nots with respect to literacy. Although we have argued that such dichotomies distort reality (as there are many types and levels of literacy), we have not yet addressed the question of skill retention; indeed, almost no one else has either.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Literacy, Culture and DevelopmentBecoming Literate in Morocco, pp. 209 - 235Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 1994