National Adult Literacy Database

October 17, 2011

This week, we have a story written by Agnes Philbrow, from Portage la Prairie, Manitoba. Agnes is enrolled in literacy classes at the Portage Learning and Literacy Centre.

My Excuses for Not Knowing How to Read

by Agnes Philbrow

I would use many excuses:

• I am busy go play
• Not now, go ask your father
• Saying I forgot my glasses
• I am new in this area, and I am lost
• Does this bus go to so and so place?

I would repeat excuses over and over. I would change topics and create distractions. I would look at pictures familiar to me, as a guide. This was the world I lived in, and it blocked me from the wonders of the world.

These wonders included fiction, science, recipes, news, bulletins, music, and travel. I mostly stayed in my comfort zone, but I longed to go further.

Many years ago there were no computers, and TV did not have a lot of channels. In the last 50 years things have changed so fast. There is more immigration, and more people are travelling to far off places. People are now speaking up that they want to learn.

*To read more of Agnes’s story, please click on this link, which goes to Write On!, Spring 2011, the Literacy Partners of Manitoba (LPM) magazine – see page 7: http://www.mb.literacy.ca/write-on/2011spring.pdf.