According to a report by the Progress in International Reading Literacy Study (PIRLS), Arab students in Israel are far behind their Jewish peers in reading comprehension.  Israeli fourth-graders who spoke Arabic at home ranked 40th in a series of tests, while Hebrew speaking children ranked in 11th or 8th place, depending how the data was analyzed.

The Israeli Arab students scored higher than students in the other Arabic-speaking countries tested by PIRLS—Kuwait, Qatar, and Morocco.  Education Minister Yuli Tamir said that gaps between Arab and Jewish students in Israel had begun shrinking due to curriculum changes in Arab schools.