Very interesting . It does seem that humans learn to read words and c.n f.l in the ws which
they would n.t be a.e to do if they read just lrs. Teaching them whole words may well make them
speed readers .
India tackles adult illiteracy
By Richard Black BBC Science correspondent in Chandigar
India set a target of reducing illiteracy to 5% by 2020 Researchers in India have been giving
details of a novel scheme aimed at increasing adult literacy. It works by teaching people whole
words rather than individual letters, and the scientists who developed it say it costs about $2 for
each adult.
So far some 40,000 adults have learned to read this way, researchers say.
About 35% of Indians are illiterate, which has a significant impact on the national economy, as well
as on the lives of individual people.
The new method has been developed by researchers at the company Tata Consultancy Services.
The results have been presented at the Indian Science Congress in Chandigar.
Word as image
Conventional literacy programmes which work from the letters of the alphabet upwards can take
several years to run and need trained teachers.
Researchers from the Tata Consultancy Services set the goal of teaching people to the level where
they could read a newspaper in their own language. They also say the new method is fast and cheap.
"Counting the salary of supervisor, everything else, the cost of making a person literate is less
than 100 Rupees ($2.2)," Dr FC Kohli told the congress.
Dr Kohli said that it takes on average 10 weeks before they can read a paper.
The key is that humans are good at recognizing pictures and images, so each word is taught as
a picture.
India's literacy targets
Once they've reached this level they start spontaneously to identify and use individual letters.
The programmes run on computer and don't need trained teachers.
Five Indian languages have so far been included, with a further 13 planned, and the software has
been given to Indian state governments.
The national government has set a target of reducing illiteracy to 5% by 2020.
It sees India's per capita income lagging behind major competitors such as China, and believes
illiteracy is one of the most important reasons why.