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Making Teenagers Read Newspapers. A Nationwide Experiment in French High Schools

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Re: Making Teenagers Read Newspapers. A Nationwide Experiment in French High Schools

#11

Major newspapers and even local ones (if they still exist) have been so dumbed down in the past few decades. I would estimate that many are now written to target a less-than-high-school literacy level. Worse, news often seems to be written to elicit outrage or fear (probably because "engagement").

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Re: Making Teenagers Read Newspapers. A Nationwide Experiment in French High Schools

#12

Major newspapers and even local ones (if they still exist) have been so dumbed down in the past few decades. I would estimate that many are now written to target a less-than-high-school literacy level. Worse, news often seems to be written to elicit outrage or fear (probably because "engagement").

Yeah, it's really sad, but it's a nail in the coffin of democracy. And prosperity. The news papers here seem to be written for 30/40 yr old, middle class women with just enough spare time to feel guilty about other people's behavior.

Re: Making Teenagers Read Newspapers. A Nationwide Experiment in French High Schools

#14

Major newspapers and even local ones (if they still exist) have been so dumbed down in the past few decades. I would estimate that many are now written to target a less-than-high-school literacy level. Worse, news often seems to be written to elicit outrage or fear (probably because "engagement").

I can't access the article, so I don't know which newspaper they were subscribed to. But, given the wording of "the leading national newspaper", I can assume it would be "Le Monde".

The audience for the written paper is not less-than-high-school educated. Do you think the wording is at this level ?

Eg: https://www.lemonde.fr/en/france/article/2026/09/08/pisa-202...

Re: Making Teenagers Read Newspapers. A Nationwide Experiment in French High Schools

#15

Major newspapers and even local ones (if they still exist) have been so dumbed down in the past few decades. I would estimate that many are now written to target a less-than-high-school literacy level. Worse, news often seems to be written to elicit outrage or fear (probably because "engagement").

They've been dumbed down for a reason...

Re: Making Teenagers Read Newspapers. A Nationwide Experiment in French High Schools

#16

Major newspapers and even local ones (if they still exist) have been so dumbed down in the past few decades. I would estimate that many are now written to target a less-than-high-school literacy level. Worse, news often seems to be written to elicit outrage or fear (probably because "engagement").

In Germany, there was a survey around 2009/2010, depicting that more than 60% of the audience of the major national daily newsshow do not understand the words used by the moderators

(it was about "Tagesschau", a major news outlet by the public broadcasting system)

Re: Making Teenagers Read Newspapers. A Nationwide Experiment in French High Schools

#19
How about making teenagers seek out independent media? We've seen the results of people being raised reading MSM newspapers and it's not pretty. Propaganda packaged as "serious news", is some of the most dangerous media that exists.

Re: Making Teenagers Read Newspapers. A Nationwide Experiment in French High Schools

#20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Free subscription + a media education module for their teachers. Without making them read it, they showed high usage of the free subscription.

Yeah, I got that from the abstract too. I just don't understand where the “making teenagers read newspapers” angle comes from.

There's a more subtle form of 'make' where you set conditions to induce a result. The fact is, giving anything away for free will increase its consumption.
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