Literacy Levels in the United States

The literacy attained to graduate from High School or even college if not maintained diminishes over time and mean about half the population would tend to prefer Bible Stories over being handed a book. This is another reason why the regular use of Chronological Bible Teaching and Chronological Bible Storytelling must regain it's place in the U.S. Church instead of just being a technique used on the "mission field". We are the mission field.

From Grant Lovejoy's paper on Chronological Bible Storytelling

In 1992 the United States Department of Education (DOE) released the results of the National Adult Literacy Survey (NALS). When DOE tested the literacy competence of adults in that country, it discovered that 48-51% of them performed at the two lowest levels on the literacy scale: illiterate and functionally illiterate. Nearly a third of American adults were in the next category, semi-literate. They are considered literate for reporting purposes, but are likely to have oral communications preferences just the same.

Only 18-21% of adults in the U. S. demonstrated skills sufficient for them to be rated either “literate” or “highly literate.” When the Canadian government performed essentially the same kind of study in the mid-1990s, the results were comparable.