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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

#281

Post by lmm »

kderbyma wrote: post #276
pie_flavor wrote: post #138

Anime is an extremely lucrative market, and Westerners spend an absurd amount of money on it, with Hollywood missing out. It's not because it's Japanese, or its weirder quirks, it's just because Japan is making it and Hollywood isn't, because Hollywood is institutionally incapable of believing people want (a) weird fantasy (b) that takes itself seriously (c) in quantity over quality, or even that adult media can be a…

Sounds like committees....animes tend to have a visionary person who writes the core story and characters..... Hollywood is filled with board rooms of groups who are all incentivized in a way to 'get buy in' through concessions.... the first concession is the art...the vision.... then the talent.... then it's all down hill from there

> Sounds like committees....animes tend to have a visionary person who writes the core story and characters.....

Funny, I've heard the exact opposite complaint a lot, that every anime in the last 20 years is made by committee and that's why the vast majority of anime are just slavish adaptations of already-successful manga, and even the few original anime projects that happen tend to be retreads of genre cliches.

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

#282

Post by lmm »

philomath_mn wrote: post #182
fatnoah wrote: post #171

As the parent of a 16 year old, I find this discussion fascinating. My son used to love reading books, from when we started with the "Bob Books" in Kindergarten, through somewhere around 5th or 6th grade. He still loves reading, but mostly for items of topical interest. He does it for fun, to entertain himself, and to learn new things...but it's not books! He scarfs up online content like it's going out of style. TBH…

It is a good question, but reading 400 pages of content is not the same as reading a book. Books are (usually) the product of intentional long-form writing along with heavy editing and review. The ideas per unit of a book are usually more polished than the ideas in a similar sized unit of online content. (not criticizing your kid btw, sounds like he is doing great).

> The ideas per unit of a book are usually more polished than the ideas in a similar sized unit of online content.

Is there any objective measure of this? Books have to be 300+ pages because that's the size you can sell them in, I've seen plenty of books that feel padded out because, well, they've been padded out.

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

#283

Post by em-bee »

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…

another vote for audio books.

i was an avid reader in my youth but stopped when i entered university (and got a computer (guess where i spend most of my time instead of reading books ;-))

about a decade ago i discovered audiodrama, short story audio magazines and finally whole audiobooks. i mostly listened to them on my commute. later when i had no commute i started going for walks (to get out of the house and move) and i also listen during housework or other mundane tasks. i tried listening before going to sleep, but that didn't work because i would doze away and miss sections while hearing others. that meant hi had to relisten the next day to catch what i missed.

i get about an hour of listening time on average, sometimes two, when i have a good daily routine, less otherwise.

one hour per day is enough to listen to 2-3 books per month. i alternate between all three types so i usually only get one book in a month, sometimes less. but that adds up too. my reading list has almost 80 titles. with an average of 10 hours per book you can finish a whole book in a month with only 20 minutes per day.

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

#284

Post by em-bee »

emseetech wrote: post #246
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…

| Any tips? Here's a trick that helped me after a ten+ year hiatus and having my attention fried by social media: A lot of people who have lost their attention span to technology will find themselves reading but not absorbing, their mind wandering, until they realize they'd "read" 3 pages and don't remember what happened. So read slow and with purpose, but most importantly at the end of each page, ask yourself what y…

i got the same problem with audiobooks. if my mind is occupied i have to relisten, sometimes multiple times, until i can focus enough.

it does depend on the writing style though. it happens more when the story is difficult to understand.

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

#285

Post by skydhash »

skeaker wrote: post #264
IncreasePosts wrote: post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, a 30 second tiktok clip cannot give you the same type of knowledge that a 300 page book can. That is such a silly thing to say, that I can only imagine you heard it on tiktok.

To play devil's advocate, it has become common to simply read a plot synopsis on something like Wikipedia rather than engage with the book/movie/show/etc. be it for lack of time or interest. This brings one up to speed with the content of the media and is often interesting enough to be worth doing while also taking 1/1000th of the investment. Such a synopsis could be reasonably condensed into a thirty second video. O…

You can summarize Margin Call with a paragraph, but in no way capture the spirit of the movie and the various implied subplots. If you don't care about a movie or a book, don't consume it or just read a summary. But don't pretend you've done the actual watching/reading.

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

#287

Post by tifik »

koalaman wrote: post #286

My daughter stopped reading when her school forced an ipad on us with no way for us to administer our own screen time controls. Now I never know if she's doing homework or trapped down some YouTube shorts rabbit hole.

Forced an iPad? How is that legal? Isn't it possible to do whatever assignments she is getting on a PC?

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

#288

Post by tigen »

SpaceManNabs wrote: post #172
tigen wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What is the case, they literally are not allowed to have (any) books in the classroom? Can you be specific as to the mechanism here? Do you yourself have any link to any evidence? You (the article) are making the claim.

Teachers are leaving the profession en masse because they feel unsafe, unsupported, underpaid, and harassed by national organizations. Teacher unions list book bans as one of the primary reasons for leaving. They have data and testimony backing that up. We see legislation and organizations all over America. Here is a quick article describing the number of books being banned and the effects it has on teachers [1]. It…

From first principles, it is normal to ban material. The ages and exact policies are debatable but these articles are entirely one-sided.

It appears that most of the handwringing is about politically disagreeing with the bans, not hardships of obeying bans. There are always bans. But they want this material (sexuality, gender, "race theory") available even to pretty young children because of their societal goals/agenda. Others do not want that. Fight.

This recent WSJ article mentions primarily reasons of salary and student behavior, as any layman would guess from first principles. It did mention "political battles over issues such as how race and gender are discussed". Well, this is not going away -- the battle is fought from multiple directions. Another direction is the industry profits from institutions being morally obligated to buy a lot of new diversity-related books.

https://www.wsj.com/us-news/education/teachers-leaving-quitt...

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

#289

Post by btilly »

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…

And what is the value of that homework for learning?

Close to zero! A lot of the time it is done wrong, which just cements wrong ideas that need to be unlearned.

It's only jobs are to be PR about how rigorous school is, and to hurt underprivileged kids whose parents can't help with homework. :(

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

#290

Post by em-bee »

foobarian wrote: post #238
octokatt wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It sounds like you enjoy books, the problem is convincing yourself you deserve to take time to read them. To quiet that anxiety: > The habit of reading is a meaningful way to meditatively intake large portions of information. Reading helps with creativity, focus, and communication. Reading light-hearted, entertaining books increases these skills while preserving focus for work in a way that reading the latest O'Reill…

> the problem is convincing yourself you deserve to take time to read them This hits home in so many more ways than just reading. I find it hard to do any leisure activities because doing them means I have spare time to do any of a thousand items on my personal backlog. It's very stressful.

the average audio book is 10 hours long. let's say reading a book takes 10 hours. then you only need 20 minutes per day to read one book per month. it should not be hard to find that time.

what you say suggests that you have a backlog of non-leisure activities that you feel are more important.

i solved this by making leisure activities more important. call it work-life balance if that helps. leisure is part of a healthy day. i started going for a daily walk for exercise. i considered important for my well being. i watch one tv show per day. and only one. i simply decided that is part of a healthy routine. and i made a list of what i want to watch so i don't waste that hour on random stuff. i still do spend more time on random stuff, eg youtube, but that is a different problem. when i run out of time, i stop wasting time on youtube, but i don't stop that one tv episode. i figure i have earned the break after being busy for a day. i should do the same with listening to audiobooks/stories but i haven't been able to re-establish that routine yet.

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