Australian Literacy Statistics

Source “Speech Pathology Australia Literacy Enquiry Submission 2005”

Approximately 16% of Australian children have difficulties learning to read (Westwood,
2001).

Speech and language impairment in preschool children is frequently a precursor of language and literacy difficulties that persist throughout childhood into adolescence and beyond (Catts, Fey, Tomblin, & Zhang, 2002; Leitão & Fletcher, 2004; Lewis & Freebairn, 1992; Roth, Speece, & Cooper, 2002; Snowling,
Bishop, & Stothard, 2000).

Between 41% and 75% of children with early expressive language delays continue to exhibit reading problems at age 8 years (Law, Boyle, Harris, Harkness, & Nye, 1998).

The ongoing incidence of literacy difficulties in adolescent children with a history of speech and language impairment  is also high: difficulties were apparent in 52% of adolescent students with resolved speech and language impairment  and 93% of a group of 15 year olds.

Reading failure is considered by the National Institute of Child Health and Human
development in America to be a national public health problem. The 2001 US Congress
Hearing on Measuring Success states that surveys of adolescents and young adults with
criminal records indicate that at least half have reading difficulties.

Recent Australian research has highlighted both the poorer language processing and production skills of a group of male juvenile offenders (Snow & Powell, 2004) as well as higher rates of poor literacy skills in young offenders (Putnins, 1999).

It is widely recognised that early intervention results in the best outcomes for children
experiencing difficulties learning to read (Catts et al., 2002; Lundberg, Frost, & Peterson,
1988).

Scientifically based research provides evidence for the effectiveness of instruction
in areas including phonological awareness, phonics, vocabulary and comprehension in addition to word recognition skills (Armbruster, Lehr, & Osborn, 2003; McCardle &
Chhabra, 2004).