Bob Griffin @ 19:10:

“There’s this neuroplasticity window that starts to close down at about 9 or 10-years old. The human brain becomes much more hardwired after about 9 or 10-years-old in acquiring skills like learning to read or decode text in particular. It becomes much more labor intensive, much more difficult if you don’t hit that window. That’s why the number one objective, the number one focus of the State Board of Education is kids learning to read at grade level by grade 3.”

If children don’t learn to read by about third grade, they’ll likely never become proficient readers because the brain loses its elasticity for language after about age 9 — which will be catastrophic for many Alaskans, because the majority in school right now can’t read very well by third grade.

Once this window shuts, it can never be reopened, because of how the brain works. We’re setting up Alaskans for failure by not having effective reading education in our public schools; though, they’re among the most expensive in the nation, even when cost of living is taken into effect, Bob Griffin says.

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