African American English and Reading: Perspectives and Solutions

Introduction:

Significant gaps in academic achievement persist between black and white children in our public schools. According to Bub, Murnane, Willett and McCartney (2005), "black-white gaps in reading and math skills among 17-year-olds are more than one-third larger in 2004 than ...15 years earlier" (p. 1). In their study of 889 black children, it was noted that black children begin school approximately one-third to one standard deviation below their white peers with regard to reading skills, and the gap increases annually through third grade. Fryer and Levitt's (2004) study of 20,000 children yielded similar increases in the achievement gap.

Bub et al. reported that, "early reading skills among black children are more predictive of later academic success than for white children" (p. 22). Although black children are more likely to come from low-income homes (Federal Interagency Forum on Child and Family Statistics, 2000), even African American children from middle-income homes fall below white peers on achievement tests (Singham 1998).

Both Bub et al. and Fryer and Levitt controlled for multiple factors ranging from socio-economic and other family variables to levels of safety in the schools. However, no mention was made in either study of the fact that many black children speak African American English (AAE). This key variable (AAE) has been largely ignored by researchers in other fields.

ASHA (2001) policy states that reading comes under the purview of the speech-language pathologist (SLP). Due to our training, SLPs understand dialects and interactions between spoken and written language better than most other school professionals. Therefore, SLPs have the responsibility to educate ourselves and our colleagues about AAE dialect, the impact of dialect on reading and strategies for maximizing the reading skills of dialect speakers.

The Origin of AAE:

Johnson (1925) reported the year 1619 as the year the first slave ship sailed from Europe to Africa, eventually arriving in Virginia. Without formal instruction in English, African slaves needed a way to communicate with the world around them. Their native languages were the Niger-Kongo languages of West Africa including Ewe, Twi, Igbo and Efik (Borishade, 1994). Borishade reported most European and American slave traders did not recognize the African languages and they believed Africans were incapable of producing a grammatically complex language. No effort was made to teach slaves a common language, and therefore, it was up to the slaves to bridge the communication gap.