Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

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

slate.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

141–150 of 504 posts

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

#141

Post by chrisan »

bluerooibos wrote: post #99
gwbas1c wrote: post #88

Take a closer look at how much homework children have, and how much assigned, mandatory reading children have. I went to a private "college prep" high school, and the amount of assigned, mandatory reading was insane. I spent so much time reading assigned novels that I just didn't have time to read for pleasure. (And why read for pleasure if I already spent 30+ minutes reading a boring / awful novel as part of my home…

> rediscovered reading Any tips? I didn't, somehow. After leaving high school, then university, my brain went into full on "be productive all the time" mode. My brain somehow doesn't think reading is a good use of my time, so I've settled for audiobooks when falling asleep or on long drives. The last book I was able to devour and actually enjoyed was the Harry Potter series, which ended just before I went to universi…

I wouldn't call audiobook "settling", I enjoy them more than books with a great narrator.

What got me back into reading was Harry Potter. I hadn't read a book for fun since middle school and had grown to loathing reading of any kind from all the assigned reading. (just give me the cliff notes).

HP was new, all the rage, and wife convinced me to give it a try (she had always been an avid reader). I had maybe 3 books to catch up on and I read them all back to back and was eagerly awaiting the 4th. We'd do midnight releases and each buy our own book and didn't sleep till we were through.

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

#142

Post by WalterBright »

65 wrote: post #68

Another issue is books are too long. Especially non-fiction books. Book publishers know no one is going to buy a 50 page book, so there has to be filler and excessive detail to make a book long enough to be sellable. It ends up just being the same thing over and over again. The author explaining minute details about the day they interviewed someone, what the weather was like, extreme details of the interviewee's faci…

Haha. Most books are padded or compressed so they fit pretty much the same volume. A paperback can have dense, small type in it, or larger type with wide margins to "puff up" the size. I've also noticed some paperbacks having thicker pages to make it look like there's more material. I suspect books the same size can have a 2:1 difference in the amount of text.

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

#143

Post by chrisan »

iknowSFR wrote: post #129
bluerooibos wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> rediscovered reading Any tips? I didn't, somehow. After leaving high school, then university, my brain went into full on "be productive all the time" mode. My brain somehow doesn't think reading is a good use of my time, so I've settled for audiobooks when falling asleep or on long drives. The last book I was able to devour and actually enjoyed was the Harry Potter series, which ended just before I went to universi…

Try Brandon Sanderson novels. General change to my habits has been that if I’m not feeling a story, it’s okay to put it down. The amount of reading I have trudged through because I was afraid of quitting…

Brando Sando or Wheel of Time :)

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

#144

Post by gknoy »

MisterBastahrd wrote: post #42
voidpointercast wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A lot of the same for me, down to reading silly non-fiction books just to read something as a child. This has become nearly vestigial as I've gotten older. I'm curious what books you felt were 'for' you?

Books like Huckleberry Finn, Tom Sawyer, Brave New World, 1984, Animal House, Treasure Island, The Lord of the Flies, The Old Man and the Sea, etc. made much more sense to me than any of the Judy Bloom style books that are so prevalent. The last of those books I enjoyed was "How to Eat Fried Worms," and then, that only resonated with me because we were forced to participate in a school book dressup day and I realized…

I am not sure if you've already experienced-and-disliked his work, but may I recommend Neal Stephenson? I have always appreciated his style of prose, and the way he describes characters. He writes in a nerdy way that I can't quite explain, and I always trust that he will weave separate-seeming narratives together in a way that is satisfying (even if I am often dissatisfied at the _endings_ of his books).

Everyone points to Snow Crash (which I liked too), but recently I also really enjoyed REAMDE and the first half of Termination Shock (I haven't finished it yet). I love the way he describes things. I'd like to say that I could read + enjoy anything he writes on any subject, but for some reason I didn't like his Baroque Cycle books (but don't understand why not).

Also big recommendation for Terry Pratchett. The books all seem silly on the surface but usually have some incisive commentary on wider social issues, as well as being filled with references and humor, subtle and un-subtle. Bonus, they are also a lot shorter than Stephenson's. ;)

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

#145

Post by monknomo »

tivert wrote: post #111
lostlogin wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the argument is quite subtle. There is a lot of book banning occurring and the rate seems to be increasing fast (see links below). There are penalties in some jurisdictions and zero teachers want to face the kind of shit that has gone on with parents and politicians, churches and local body meetings. So rather than search out each book they have and keep track of its status, then recheck a few weeks later, ju…

> So rather than search out each book they have and keep track of its status, then recheck a few weeks later, just remove the lot. That doesn't pass the smell test. The only way I can see that being even remotely true is if the teacher's goal is mainly to push up against someone's line, politically. Even in the most hostile environment, I doubt you'd run afoul of anyone with a well-stocked library of widely beloved c…

"widely beloved" by whom? "classic" in what sense?

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

#146

Post by ghaff »

allturtles wrote: post #100
65 wrote: post #68

Another issue is books are too long. Especially non-fiction books. Book publishers know no one is going to buy a 50 page book, so there has to be filler and excessive detail to make a book long enough to be sellable. It ends up just being the same thing over and over again. The author explaining minute details about the day they interviewed someone, what the weather was like, extreme details of the interviewee's faci…

It sounds like you're talking about adult non-fiction bestsellers. I don't think that has much to do with the reading habits of nine-year-olds. There are plenty of 80-150 page books being published for this age group.

And there are tons of novellas and short stories in many genres.

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

#147

Post by dumpsterdiver »

bluerooibos wrote: post #99
gwbas1c wrote: post #88

Take a closer look at how much homework children have, and how much assigned, mandatory reading children have. I went to a private "college prep" high school, and the amount of assigned, mandatory reading was insane. I spent so much time reading assigned novels that I just didn't have time to read for pleasure. (And why read for pleasure if I already spent 30+ minutes reading a boring / awful novel as part of my home…

> rediscovered reading Any tips? I didn't, somehow. After leaving high school, then university, my brain went into full on "be productive all the time" mode. My brain somehow doesn't think reading is a good use of my time, so I've settled for audiobooks when falling asleep or on long drives. The last book I was able to devour and actually enjoyed was the Harry Potter series, which ended just before I went to universi…

Setting aside time for relaxation and leisure activities is highly productive, but unfortunately that isn't something that becomes obvious until your work visibly suffers from "all work and no play". The costs of overworking yourself truly are insidious. It really is akin to a rogue wave - you don't know how deep it runs until it finally hits.

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

#148

Post by tigen »

rimunroe wrote: post #109
tigen wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The defunding thing sounds like a bit of obligatory politics. "In some states, teachers can’t even keep a classroom library because they have to protect themselves from book bans" Yeah this sounds false.

What sounds false about it? A (very straightforward) search surfaced this article https://www.vice.com/en/article/bvmq54/florida-teachers-are-...

That does not say teachers can't keep a library. At most it says that the titles in said library need to be reviewed/approved by the school.

The emphasis on "taking away libraries" appears to be partly politically motivated.

This isn't about censorship per se since we have a baseline expectation of censorship. We already don't allow teachers to stock racist material or porn in classrooms. This new thing seems to that there are LGBT books which veer close to the edge with stuff like explicit sex scenes.

It mentions other "proposed" laws, some of which seemingly setting a lower bar. But "proposed" laws aren't banning libraries now.

In any case, how can this possibly be an important and relevant issue today contributing to an already-observed decline in reading in 9-year olds nationally?

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

#149

Post by blindriver »

I'm in my 50s and I used to read a lot for pleasure when I was a kid. I still remember reading Lord of the Rings or Watership Down over an entire weekend, with my mom yelling at me to stop reading and eat dinner, etc. Books like To Kill a Mockingbird and Catcher in the Rye changed my life as a youth.

I stopped reading fiction after I graduated college because I simply didn't care anymore, it was like an off switch. Unless it was a computer or finance textbook, I simply didn't care to read. There was a brief hiatus after reading Moneyball and Blind Side which fascinated me for some reason, and I haven't read non-textbooks since then either. I think part of it was that I read so many bad fiction books I didn't want to waste my time taking a chance when I could be programming or learning more directly.

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

#150

Post by imzadi »

fullwaza wrote: post #124
imzadi wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, first, audiobooks totally count. Have you tried Dungeon Crawler Carl?

Crazy timing, I'm listening to that series now, it's great!

It's my favorite. I've listened to all the books 6+ times.
Post reply on HN