It was yet another wet, brisk morning.
I was standing just inside the pencil crayon fence, hoping it would shelter me from the fine rain that was covering my glasses and blinding me. I was holding hands with Oscar, listening to him singing âThe journey home from grandpaâsâ while Jacob was pleading with me to go to the Reading CafĂŠ after school.
Then, from across the playground, another mummy approached meâŚ
âCan you tell me what that sign says please, I canât read.â
Those 3 little words â “I canât read” â have left me feeling sick for weeks. How can you get to adulthood and not know how to read? How has society let you fall between the cracks so badly?
Needing to find out more, I was disturbed to discover that in England, 1 in 6 adults are âfunctionally illiterateâ.
According to the National Literacy Trust, this means, “they can understand short straightforward texts on familiar topics accurately and independently, and obtain information from everyday sources, but reading information from unfamiliar sources, or on unfamiliar topics, could cause problems.”
Take a moment to imagine itâŚ
A world where youâre deprived of the opportunity to apparate into another world, standing shoulder-to-shoulder with Harry to fight the forces of darkness. Or venturing around the world in 80 days. Or undertaking a journey that will see you face great hardship in your bid to return the precious to its rightful homeâŚ
A world where it doesnât matter how many ingredients you have, because you canât read the recipe, so youâll never be able to replicate one of Jamieâs 30-minute meals, bake a birthday cake, or enjoy one of @EJCownleyâs slow cooker suppersâŚ
A world where you wonât ever benefit from the insight and wisdom shared through #ContentClubUK or #Write52âŚ
A world where you risk drinking coffee that isnât caffeinated because you donât understand the word âdecafâ, or eating cake that contains carrotsâŚ
A world where you donât understand signs, instructions or dosagesâŚ
And a world where at the end of every night, you canât cuddle up with your babies and read them a bedtime story about the cat in the hat, poo in the zoo, or how a sausage went for a walk one dayâŚ
As a copywriter, words make my world. To take that from me would be the most horrifying nightmare of them all.