Looking for Meaning

The phone rang. It was Ben, wanting to ask me a question. He had submitted an entry to his school's Writing Olympics, third-grade tier. His submission had been published and now he was to read it aloud to the gathering of students and their parents and other interested adults, which would extend all the way to grandparents. His mother had been working with him to make the passage understandable. If you've ever been to a similar function of second to sixth graders, you'll have some idea of what goes on in terms of intelligibility of the readings. So the child asked, "Do you think it's really important that people understand what you read to them?" I wanted to support his mother's efforts and say absolutely, that was the purpose of reading to an audience, and one of the basic elements of communication. Instead, I told him that it was not vitally important because the audience was there to support their children, and it really didn't matter what the level of performance was. After all, this is voluntary, not a test, and this was not a SPORTS event. Based on prior experience, I said that about 85% of the young authors would not read their works in a manner that could be heard and understood. It was not worth worrying about: written copies were provided and no one would criticize even the shyest or speediest of readers. Only if you want to be one of the kids that everyone could hear and comprehend should you be concerned about being understood. I don't know if he knew what I meant, but I believe it to be true.