A distressing finding from the present study was not only a concern from the mothers about "doing it the wrong way", but that by working with their children, they would be too far ahead of their peers and the perception that this would upset their teachers. Andrea mentions that if her daughter "wants to learn at home, like I won't let her go too, too far ahead." Natalie saw a role in helping her sons with their schoolwork, but adds that "if I can't do it the right way, someone else should show him the way." Therefore, some of the parents in this study sometimes feel that literacy activities are best left to the school and teachers. While this belief is not compatible with that of educators in the field or the academy, it may be a function of a society that places far too great an emphasis on schooled literacy.

Although there is no doubt that higher education may equip children from low-income homes for improved prospects in securing employment with greater earning power given the gate-keeping function of educational attainment in the employment sector, there is no evidence that schooled literacy enhances the skills needed to sustain gainful employment in the trades or service sector into which many of these children may well find employment. For such employment prospects, it is certain that functional literacy may enhance not only their employment prospects but their personal situations in being able to read for enjoyment and to guard against personal abuse through inability to understand the wording of contracts of various kinds.

For children who aspire to attain higher levels of education and employment, however, it is equally certain that this will not happen without achieving schooled literacy at the very least since this will ensure that they will attain a high school diploma that has become the minimal standard required for most employment situations. Gone are the days when a young man with only a grade seven education may work his way up to amass a fortune through hard work and innate intelligence as one very dear gentleman of my acquaintance (now departed) once managed to do. Nevertheless, for children aspiring to attain cultural capital of any kind, schooled literacy may be a condition of that result but it will never suffice. According to Kelly (1997) what is needed in this case is "multiple and enabling literacies" that "provide for possibility and empowerment," (p. 79). Kelly (1997) adds that to achieve this, it is necessary that educators: