Did You Understand What You Read?

iPhone or book? Don’t make me choose. I’d always choose the last one. 

My friend, when you visit my house, all you see are books. It smells like books. If you touch its walls, you may feel that it holds a massive collection of books. Maybe it tastes like one too. I don’t know, I didn’t try tasting it… yet. 

I’m kidding. 

You get the hang of it. Maybe you’re thinking  “What a poor fellow, always buried between pages,” I couldn’t blame you though. I sometimes think that about myself too. 

Until… until I entered this university.

See, if you want to be that cool guy in our Education department, you should always carry a book with you. Always, always buried between pages.

Because hell, no one reads! 

Did you hear me? No one reads anymore! No… one… reads… anymore! Almost everyone is glued to their smartphones!

I’m having a headache right now just discussing it. 

This is why, I would not be surprised to hear that among 79 countries, the Philippines scored the lowest in reading comprehension in the 2018 Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA). 

PISA is a worldwide study that examines the reading, mathematical, and scientific abilities of students. I will just focus on reading. Let us not look at our Mathematical and Scientific abilities too. Trust me, they’re not so happy.

“Reading proficiency is essential for a wide variety of human activities – from following instructions in a manual; to finding out the who, what, when, where, and why of an event; to communicating with others for a specific purpose or transaction,” the summary of the PISA 2018 results says.

Did you know what first came to my mind when I read that?

I remember this one Facebook post. I remember seeing a status with all the details about a certain job application, and full instructions of sending an email, with attached resumé and a 2×2 photo, to ‘blablabla@gmail.com’. 

Of course, I just made up the ‘blablabla’ but you get it. The instruction was clear.

Then I opened the comment section. 87 comments from 87 Filipinos. Only three said ‘thank you. The rest either said ‘How?’ or ‘Do I send my resumé here?’. 

When people see words, they see it as a labyrinth maze game. They do not bother to find the start and locate the end. They want instant details without decoding letters. It’s an anti-syntax generation.

The syntax is out, Insta is on. 

People pay attention to environmental problems, diseases, unemployment, terrorism, but never comprehension. It’s not bad, a person chooses his own advocacy. 

However, if everyone would keep watering the fruits, who would sustain the roots? 

I will, and you will too.

I would like to take responsibility. Do you want to? Because a person who sees the problem is the first response to that problem too. We would not like to be one of those who see the underlying issues but wouldn’t call themselves to action. 

We will not win through that. 

This, my friend, is my advocacy. Addressing Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) #4, which aims to help people love stories, love language, and love seeing them, and not just hearing them. 

It could be your advocacy too.

Our lack of ability to have good reading comprehension as a country is at a critical point. If we address this, maybe people would know how to follow instructions. Maybe the words they read will create something new in them. If they read something about trees, climate, global warming, pollution, war, and death… they would be able to sympathize. 

How sure am I that people will read these topics? Well, I am a reader. One thing I learned is to never underestimate the power of writers to hook you into something you would not even try to discuss with yourself before. 

Reading is fundamental. 

It will always be.