Ara Balears in English - crockery

Why reading comprehension is collapsing: “Children arrive who only know 20 words”

Jaume Cladera Mas — Thu, 22 Oct 2026 19:20:43 +0000

There are children who know how to read, but do not know how to explain what they have read. They can pronounce the words of a text and reach the end of the page, but when the teacher asks them what that which they have just read means, the answer does not come. It is a scene that teachers consulted by ARA Balears claim to find more and more often in classrooms and which helps to understand a piece of data that is hard to forget: the Balearic Islands have lost 31 points in reading comprehension in the PISA tests, from the 472 of the previous edition to the current 441. The decline does not speak only of books. Reading comprehension is the ability to understand a text, relate its information, make inferences and draw conclusions from it. And, according to the teachers and professors consulted, the difficulties begin long before a student has a PISA text in front of them. They begin when they do not yet know how to read.

Read to live well

Sebastià Portell — Thu, 24 Sep 2026 05:30:37 +0000

I don't know if I am more saddened by the results of the latest PISA report or by the fact that we have definitively left behind the famous name with which it was once christened by Joana Maria Camps, Minister of Education in the time of José Ramón Bauzá. Be that as it may, and jokes aside, it seems that our children and young people are well and truly 'trampled', if we compare our local results with the European average in areas such as reading, mathematics, and science.As a writer and translator, but above all as a person who could never conceive of themselves if it were not through the conversation with others and the world that is reading, I am particularly concerned that the report points out that the new generations have no problem reading short paragraphs, but that they find significant difficulties when they have to understand and process complex or longer texts. That is to say, they 'can' read, but they do not 'know' how to read properly, plain and simple.Given this, I think it is important not to forget that reading can be great entertainment, but also many other things. Reading is an essential competence to live in the world in which we live: actions as basic as understanding well and signing a contract, following political current events and the main social debates, or defending one's own rights with complex and at the same time forceful arguments are difficult to imagine without having a minimum background in reading and writing. Because reading is as much like understanding as writing is like thinking, like formulating, and when we know how to do both things well, we have more tools to inhabit the world in a dignified and more conscious way.And to do so, moreover, throughout life. Often, when we speak of literacy, we think mainly of those years in which people can read for themselves and can share it with others, but numerous studies point out that reading (or having things read aloud to us, that is, being spoken to) is also essential in the so-called golden thousand days. These are those first three years in which a baby's brain has the most plasticity, in which it develops the most, in which the stories we are told, the lap songs we hear, the vocabulary that surrounds us, like a most flavorful broth, begin to make us who we are. From there to autonomous reading, of course, and from that to socialization and reading clubs for young people and adults. Passing, also, through the importance of the accompanying role that reading can have in the final stages of life, whether to combat unwanted loneliness (a chronic disease of the present) or to accompany a grieving process.Making citizens into readers means fostering their freedom in the future as well. That they will have more tools for critical thinking at their disposal, that they will better process complexity, and that, in an increasingly convulsive context, they will know how to find or seek peace, to pause, to reflect.We would be wrong if, as a society, we did not make it a priority: to live well, one must return to books.

The PISA hangover marks the start of the academic year: "We cannot contrast skills and knowledge"

Jaume Cladera Mas — Wed, 09 Sep 2026 19:03:24 +0000

Coinciding with the start of a new school year and still reeling from the defeat of the PISA results, the Balearic Islands' education system is once again facing the same question, but with renewed urgency: what should be done now? The Islands have fallen below the Spanish, EU, and OECD averages in Mathematics, Reading, and Science, and the number of students who do not reach the minimum competencies once again calls into question the system's ability to guarantee basic learning.

Balearic Islands disaster in the PISA: they sink in Mathematics and Reading

Jaume Cladera Mas — Tue, 08 Sep 2026 07:35:58 +0000

The Balearic Islands worsen their results in the three competencies evaluated by the 2025 PISA report, with an especially sharp decline in reading comprehension. Students from the Islands obtain 441 points in Reading, 449 in Mathematics and 471 in Science. The most pronounced drop is in Reading, where the Balearic Islands go from 472 points in PISA 2022 to the current 441, losing 31 points in a single cycle. In Mathematics, the setback is 22 points, from 471 to 449, while in Science the decline is more moderate: nine points, from 480 to 471. It should be remembered that, according to the same regulations that govern the tests, a difference of more than 20 points is considered significant and is equivalent to a full school year of work.