Ofsted noted that "most students join the academy with skills in reading, writing and mathematics that are well below the national averages".

BBC: Thetford Academy put in special measures

From the outset subjects such as home economics, woodworking, physical education, and typing have had a place in school curricula alongside reading, writing and mathematics.

UNESCO: II Part Analytic Section

It is by learning reading, writing and mathematics that they can break the vicious circle of misery and take their destiny into their own hands.

UNESCO: WORLDWIDE

In the new single level tests being piloted in English reading, English writing and mathematics, the questions are all pitched at a certain level of understanding.

BBC: All school Sats tests 'might go'

Proficiency scores in reading, writing, science and mathematics for American teenagers in their last year of high school all fell between 1992 and 2005.

ECONOMIST: Will reading and writing remain important?

Hardly surprising, the Department of Education reports that in 1983-84, 16% of college freshmen were enrolled in remedial reading, 21% in remedial writing and 25% in remedial mathematics.

FORBES: Are We Spending Too Much On Education?

And of all the artifacts that have aided cognition, the most important is the development of writing, or more properly, of notational systems: number systems, writing, calendars, notational systems for mathematics, engineering, music and dance.

FORBES: Magazine Article