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Literacy, Textbooks and Ideology: Postwar Literacy Instruction and the Mythology of Dick and Jane

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Literacy, Textbooks and Ideology: Postwar Literacy Instruction and the Mythology of Dick and Jane DOCUMENT RESUME ED 308 483 CS 009 710 AUTHOR Luke, Allan TITLE Literacy, Textbooks and Ideology: Postwar Literacy Instruction and the Mythology of Dick and Jane. REPORT NO ISBN-1-85000-319-X PUB DATE 88 NOTE 234p. AVAILABLE FROMTaylor and Francis, Inc., 1900 Frost Rd., Suite 101, Bristol, PA 19007 ($22.00). PUB TYPE Books (010) -- Reports - Evaluative/Feasibility (142) -- Historical Materials (060) EDRS PRICE MF01/PC10 Plus Postage. DESCRIPTORS *Basal Reading; Case Studies; Cultural Context; *Educational History; Educational Philosophy; Elementary Education; *Elementary School Curriculum; Foreign Countries; *Literacy; *Public Schools; Reading Instruction; Reading Research; *Textbook Content; Writing Instruction IDENTIFIERS *British Columbia; Canada (West) ABSTRACT Focusing on how textbooks and ideology influence and reflect literacy instruction, this book examines literacy as defined in the public elementary schools of British Columbia, Canada. Chapters include: (1) "Approaches to the Study of Literacy and Curriculum"; (2) "The Text in Historical Context: The Debate over Schooling and Literacy in Postwar British Columbia"; (3) "Making the Text: Genesis of the Modern Basal Reader"; (4) "Reading the Text: Dick and Jane as Introductions to Literacy"; (5) "Revising the Text: Nationalism and Canadian Content"; (6) "Teaching the Text: Enforcing the Norms of Literacy"; and (7) "Standardization and Redundancy: Literacy Instruction as Ideological Practice." (MM) Reproductions supplied by EDRS are the best that can be made * * from the original document. * "PERMISSION TO REPRODUCE THIS U.S. DEPARTMENT OP EDUCATION MATERIAL HAS BEEN GRANTED BY Mal ct Educational Research and Improvement EDUCATIONAL RESOURCES INFORMATION CENTER (ERIC) Eb fioortey 0 pus document has been reproduced as recemad from the person or CoglinaatIon ongonaang .t O Moor changes have been made to improve reproduction pullity TO THE EDUCATIONAL RESOURCES Pot nts of view or oCamors stated .n tata docu- ment do not necesaaraT representothmai INFORMATION CENTER (ERIC)." OERI poartron or poky eINA .eNI 401V _Nilo/ \INOVI_________Eivii The Falmer Press 9 Literacy, Textbooks and Ideology 3 Literacy, Textbooks and Ideology: Postwar Literacy Instruction and the Mythology of Dick and Jane Allan Luke The Falmer Press (A member of the Taylor & Francis Group) London, New York and Philadelphia 4 UK The Falmer Press, Falmer House, Barcombe, Lewes East Sussex, BN8 5DL USA The Falmer Press, Taylor & Francis Inc., 242 Cherry Street, Philadelphia, PA 19106-1906 Copyright © Allan Luke 1988 All right; reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval sp.em, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical,photocopying,recordingorotherwise,withoutthe prior permission in writing from the Publisher. First published in 1988 British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data Luke, Allan Literacy, textbooks and ideology. postwar literacy instruction and the mythology of Dick and Jane. 1. LiteracyCanada. I. Title. 3022'0971 LC154. ISBN 1-85000-318-1 ISBN 1-85000-319-X (Pbk.) Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Luke, Alan Literacy, textbooks, and ideology. Bibliography: p. Includes indexes. 1. LiteracyBritish ColumbiaCase studies.2. TextbooksBritish ColumbiaCase studies.3. Education, ElementaryBritish ColumbiaCase studies.4. Education and stateBritish ColumbiaCase studies. I. Title. LC154.2.B8L851988372.971188-3921 ISBN 1-85000-318-1 ISBN 1.85000 -319 -X (Pbk.) Typeset in 11/13 Bembo by Alresford Typesetting & Design, New Farm Road, Alresford, Hants. Printed in Gr^it Britain by Redwood Burn Limited, Trowbridge, Wiltshire. 5 For Edwin S. Luke and Ahlin Wong Luke 6 Contents List of Figures viii Acknowledgments ix Introduction 1 1 Approaches to the Study of Literacy and Curriculum 9 2The Text in Historical Context: The Debateover Schooling and Literacy it "lostwar British Columbia 47 3Making the Text: Genesis of the Modern Basal Reader 63 4Reading the Text: Dick and Jane as Introductions to Literacy 85 5Revising the Text: Nationalism and Canadian Content 123 6Teaching the Text: Enforcing the Norms of Literacy 154 7Standardization and Redundancy: Literacy Instructionas Ideological Practice 186 Index 215 vii 7 List of Figures Figure 1Page reproduction from Fun with Dick and Jane 102 Figure 2Page reproduction from Our New Friends 109 Figure 3Student progress chart from The Canadian Speller 175 viii Acknowledgments Many people have contributed directly and indirectly to the completion of this book. Between 1980 and 1984, Suzanne de Castell and I undertook col- laborative research on literacy and schooling: that work and her critical suggestions are reflected here. This text alsoowes a great deal to Alec McHoul, Carmen Luke and Kieran Egan, who actedas critics and editors on earlier drafts. Richard M. Coe, Paul Delany, Ted Tetsuo Aoki, Pam Gilbert, and Michael Apple provided valuablecommentary on particular sections of the work. The research for this book was supported inpart by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada, Simon Fraser University, and James Cook University of North Queensland. Harry Evans, Margarite Cronkite-Weir, Nancy Greer, Eileen Dailly, the British Columbia Ministry of Education, the Canadian High Commission in Canberra, Bob Overgaard and Hugh McPherson generously made documentary and bibliographical materials available. I would also like to acknowledge the support of Haida Luke, Richard Baldauf, Rhonda Hammer, Kelleen Toohey, Eileen Mallory, Bill Corcoran and Rob Gilbert, and the constructive help of Malcolm Clarkson and Christine Cox of Falmer Press. I am grateful to the editors of Teachers College Record for permissionto reprint parts of Chapter 3, an early version of which appeared in vol. 88, no. 5 of that journal. Finally, I would like to acknowledge the cooperation of W.J. Gage, Canada for their permissionto reprint pp. 6-7 from William S. Gray and May Hill Arbuthnot's Fun with Dick and Jane (Toronto, n.d.), pp. 6-7 from Gray and Arbuthnot's Our New Friends (Toronto, n.d.), and the back cover page from Frank Quance's The Canadian Speller (Toronto, 1950). ix Introduction The slogan `back to the basics' is above allan historical locution. The effectiveness and appeal of the rhetoric of the basicsmovement can be traced to its lack of a concrete historical referent. Whether repeated in newspaper editorial, parent-teacher meeting, political speechor news broadcast, the slogan allows addressees to recallany particular era of schooling that they may care to romanticize. Many reconstruct images of their own schooling: in the period before the permissiveness of the 1960s,we are often told, children attended, complied with school rules unquestioningly, and joined the workforce with a solid background in reading and writing.In the US and the UK the larger mythology ofpostwar educational efficiency extols an era of Empire, a period when the particular nation state in question asserted greater economic and geopoliticalpower. Hence, it should come as littlesurprise that the present rhetoric of educational reform situates `excellence' of the educational systemas a necessary and perhaps sufficient condition for capital expansion, technological innovation, political andeven military leadership. One American academic candidly explains that `the connection from here to there, from schoolhouse to missile strength, is quite clear'.' Moreover, neglect of the educationalsystem, one of the recent government reports tells us, is tantamount to national unilateral `disarma- ment',2 Since the late 1950s advocates of the human capital rationale have argued that technological progress and economic equality could be socially engineered through expansion and improvement of the schoolsystem. The parallels between the Sputnik-era educational debate and that of thepresent are many: external threats to technological and military superiority are invoked to justify a reconsideration of educational policy and practice.A range of well-financed reforms upgrading of teacher pay and training, classroom re-emphasis of the basics, renewedstress of applied and scientific studies have been placed on the state agenda. Yet through itsvery rhetoric this latest version of the human capitalargument, however detailed, 10 I Literacy, Textbooks and Ideology subjects the school system to apparent responsibility for such wider social phenomena as crime and immorality, unemployment, and the loss of technological markets and leadership. There may bea kind of poetic justice at work here. For to argue, as many politicians, teachers, academics and others have continued to do, that education is capable of remediating the social and economic problems of industrial and post-industrial capitalism, sets schooling as a potential scapegoat for the ills of that system. Nowhere is :his kind of rhetorical inversion of the promise of modern education more exploited than in debate over declines in literacy standards and instruction. Even among academics, the widespreadacceptance of what Harvey Graff has termed the 'literacy myth' continues: universal, increased levels of literacy are viewed as a necessary prerequisite and primarycause of the exercise of manifest destiny, cultural and economic development, equality and political participation.' Acceptance of the myth enables its inversion: that decreased levels of literacy are a primary determining factor for a range of social and educational problems. Yet attackson the schools for declining standards of literacy
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