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Book people think they know why 9-year-olds stop reading for fun

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Re: Book people think they know why 9-year-olds stop reading for fun

#51

Post by gazelle21 »

When I was in elementary we had a program where you could read a book and then take a test on that book. If you passed the test you would get a prize from snacks to coupons at restaurants. There were no limits and the book choice was large.

I ravenously read through books at first and would take the test asap. I was gaming the system, but through this I found books I became enthralled with. This was the foundation of my love for reading.

Not sure what my point was, but I wonder if any programs like that exist anymore.

Re: Book people think they know why 9-year-olds stop reading for fun

#52

Post by [deleted] »

wiredfool wrote: post #47
trimblent wrote: post #25

If you want your kids to read books then they should see you reading books.

Reading to kids every night early on helps. Not being pressured to read stupid crap in school helps. "You can get a library card once you learn to read" helped. Piles of books lying around helps. Older brothers reading a lot helps, especially for reading recommendations. (Father of 3, youngest is 14 now. after a while, the biggest problem is keeping them in books they haven't read)

[deleted]

Re: Book people think they know why 9-year-olds stop reading for fun

#53

Post by wiredfool »

octobus2021 wrote: post #10

Don't know why this is on HN but anyways. My youngest will be 9 soon. Finding books for him is pain. I started trying more in the last few weeks, grabbing more or less random things from my local library (beginning chapter books, chapter books). Most of them are series, he liked a few (Galaxy Zack, Time Jumpers, Desmond Cole books), did not like others (Magic Tree House, something called Byte, Code Breakers, and real…

Look at Ursula Vernon/T Kingfisher (at least the kid/YA focused ones). Danny Dragonbreath might be the right age range for the youngest (text + cartoon), and Minor Mage, Illuminations and Wizards Guide to Defensive Baking would be slightly older (chapter book level).

I'd hold off on the fairy tale (dark. weird) and romance ones (paladins) for a few years yet...

Mine have gone through Paolini (Eragon), Sanderson (all of them. damn he writes a lot), Wings of Fire (Tui Sutherland -- Cute, chapters, skews younger)., Scott Westerfield (Leviathian).

Re: Book people think they know why 9-year-olds stop reading for fun

#54

Post by jesterswilde »

I stopped reading because it became a larger part of school. I strongly disliked school, so reading was a part of the thing I strongly disliked. Really, anything they tried to force was soured on me for a long time.

My disdain for school started around 9 or 10

Re: Book people think they know why 9-year-olds stop reading for fun

#55

Post by bjornlouser »

aetherson wrote: post #43
jobs_throwaway wrote: post #36

I don't particularly buy any of the explanations given in the article, or ITT for that matter. I had tons of screen time as a child, that didn't stop me from reading a ton then or now. Schools (and I) were just as test-focused back then. I wasn't getting book recs from my peers so that doesn't make sense to me either. Maybe I'm an anomaly here but I never found the books targeted at children/teens especially interest…

Do you have kids? "Give your kids books they'd be interested in" is kind of classic meaningless advice. Like, sure, of course that's what you want to do -- except, if you have a kid who doesn't have an existing strong reading habit, how do you find books they'd be interested in? Like, that's the goal! You can't just assume the solution. I have a nine-year-old daughter who definitely does read, but isn't a voracious r…

You've probably already seen these, but just in case:

https://www.mangaclassics.com

Re: Book people think they know why 9-year-olds stop reading for fun

#56

Post by janalsncm »

> Indeed, several people I spoke to mentioned that middle-graders’ lack of phones created a marketing problem in an era when no one at any publishing house has any idea how to make a book a bestseller other than to hope it blows up on TikTok. “BookTok is imperfect,” said Karen Jensen, a youth librarian and a blogger for School Library Journal, “but in teen publishing it’s generating huge bestsellers, bringing back things from the backlist. There’s not anything like that right now for the middle-grade age group.”

This part of the article is very off-putting to me. You don’t need TikTok to find good books for kids. Kids don’t need to see digital advertisements to make a decision. They need access to a library stocked with recently published books that kids will enjoy.

The author mentions later on that libraries are being defunded, and this is likely to be the root cause. Rather than spending so many words on speculation it would’ve been nice to see some hard numbers on the subject.

Re: Book people think they know why 9-year-olds stop reading for fun

#57

Post by giancarlostoro »

bryanlarsen wrote: post #35

My daughter is 12 now, and reading tons more than when she was 9. The difference is now she has twice daily access to the high school library versus once a week access to an elementary library. Not sure how much it generalizes, but what would have had her reading more then would have been a well stocked manga section in the elementary library and daily access. Manga really is an accessible way to get used to reading,…

My daughters still a toddler, but when she sees me holding a book, she gets hers out too. I taught her to point out what the pictures are, so she does that on any book. If she can read LOTR someday, that'll be something :)

Re: Book people think they know why 9-year-olds stop reading for fun

#58

Post by johnneville »

RecycledEle wrote: post #9

When you can read for fun, it's fun. When your teacher criticizes you for not reading the boring book he/she ordered you to read, you stop enjoying reading and stop reading. It's the teachers' faults.

Required reading of books I couldn't relate to played a big role in me stopping reading for fun but I don't place that blame on my teachers for it. I doubt they had the freedom to choose which books we were assigned or whether we were assigned books at all.

Re: Book people think they know why 9-year-olds stop reading for fun

#59

Post by themanmaran »

Izkata wrote: post #50

> Yet I can’t help but be worried that the kinds of books that changed my life between ages 8 and 12 are falling by the wayside. Is there room for the thoughtful, serious, beautiful young-person’s novel in 2024? Can you publish Bridge to Terabithia in the age of Captain Underpants? ...Uh, come the 90s, Bridge to Terabithia was a required reading book that I don't think anyone my age cared about. The popular series I…

> in the age of Captain Underpants

Captain Underpants is at least 20 years old now. Becoming a piece of classic American fiction in it's own right.

Re: Book people think they know why 9-year-olds stop reading for fun

#60

Post by janalsncm »

inasio wrote: post #31
animal531 wrote: post #3

I think the big problem with reading is that it's much slower compared to other media. Add in the fact that you can also only read for so long before your eyes get tired and then people just naturally veer away from it.

I feel the opposite way, at least from the point of view of absorbing information. I often have a hard time with podcasts and often youtube videos because I feel I could have read the info there in a few minutes vs watching/listening to something for much longer

We live in an attention economy but the content that demands our attention is increasingly low value. Often the vast majority of podcast content and YouTube video content could be simplified to maybe 10% of what is there. I have unfortunately seen this in some of the nonfiction books I read as well, which tend to spend way too much time on filler and fluff than actually advancing the main points. This wastes my time and irritates me. (Stuart Russell’s most recent book is majority garbage.)
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