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Kids Rarely Read Whole Books Anymore. Even in English Class

nytimes.com

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Re: Kids Rarely Read Whole Books Anymore. Even in English Class

#301

Post by Spivak »

UncleMeat wrote: post #221
BeFlatXIII wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The kids don't hate classroom reading because of the reading; they hate it because of the associated curriculum. “Why were the curtains blue?” is a skill wasted on children. I only gained an appreciation for such meta-reading during a weeks-long TV Tropes bender during a spat of unemployment after getting fired from my first big-boy job.

The blue curtains has become an almost deranged meme at this point, completely disconnected from either curricula or evaluation. Students are not asked why singular descriptive details are chosen as such. Being able to perform critical analysis of text is an essential skill today. It might be more essential now than any other moment in history. Understanding how narrative writing uses symbols translates cleanly into…

Yes and literature is a pretty bad way to teach critical analysis. My high school did political speeches from history and that segment was infinitely more enjoyable than The Scarlet Letter.

You can just teach the thing you want to teach.

Re: Kids Rarely Read Whole Books Anymore. Even in English Class

#302

Post by UncleMeat »

Spivak wrote: post #301
UncleMeat wrote: post #221

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The blue curtains has become an almost deranged meme at this point, completely disconnected from either curricula or evaluation. Students are not asked why singular descriptive details are chosen as such. Being able to perform critical analysis of text is an essential skill today. It might be more essential now than any other moment in history. Understanding how narrative writing uses symbols translates cleanly into…

Yes and literature is a pretty bad way to teach critical analysis. My high school did political speeches from history and that segment was infinitely more enjoyable than The Scarlet Letter. You can just teach the thing you want to teach.

Sure, and there are plenty of classes that use different written forms for their pedagogy. An advantage of novels is that their length often allows for different thematic depth and complexity and their narrative can make it easier to hold a reader's attention through that length.

Re: Kids Rarely Read Whole Books Anymore. Even in English Class

#304

Post by nothercastle »

spicyusername wrote: post #115

I never understand where these anecdotes come from. I live in a rural Red State, a place you'd expect less reading, and my kids, and many of their friends, read full books all the time and have since they were quite young. The curriculum in our public school regularly requires kids to read full books for class, and the kids you'd expect from the homes you'd expect read plenty. So whatever the problem is, if there eve…

It’s probably because you are in a rural red state that isn’t concerned with equity and feelings

Re: Kids Rarely Read Whole Books Anymore. Even in English Class

#305

Post by Telaneo »

1718627440 wrote: post #290
wkat4242 wrote: post #245

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Totally agree. I do the same. The only reason we have analog clocks is because digital ones were much harder to build. That time is of course over for good. It was a compromise imposed by limited technology.

Not really, analog clocks are readable over a much longer distance, because seeing an angle needs much less information, than parsing glyphs.

Tell that to my glasses. At any sort of distance where this could be an advantage, the clock is just going to be a blur anyway.

Not to mention, how often are you in a situation where you want to know what time it is, but the nearest clock is far enough away that it being analogue becomes an actual advantage?

Re: Kids Rarely Read Whole Books Anymore. Even in English Class

#306

Post by pineappletooth »

What i found is that there is an aversion to knowledge, there is a ever increasing group of people (not only kids) that refuses everything that involves reading, learning or reasoning.

You present them a game that involves a bit of investigation and they just don't try, you think well they want to shutdown their brains at the moment of relax, but no they just never use their brains. They can't follow a manual to assemble anything no matter if they only have to connect two pieces clearly marked as put them together.

And they reach adult stage in this condition, they can't do anything else that following verbal very precise instructions, and some of them are not stupid, i found very capable people that just reject trying to read anything but have incredible reasoning skills, they just never notice because they never exercised.

Re: Kids Rarely Read Whole Books Anymore. Even in English Class

#307

Post by 1718627440 »

Telaneo wrote: post #305
1718627440 wrote: post #290

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not really, analog clocks are readable over a much longer distance, because seeing an angle needs much less information, than parsing glyphs.

Tell that to my glasses. At any sort of distance where this could be an advantage, the clock is just going to be a blur anyway. Not to mention, how often are you in a situation where you want to know what time it is, but the nearest clock is far enough away that it being analogue becomes an actual advantage?

Interesting, I also have glasses and am short-sighted, but for me light-emitting objects blur much faster than solid objects. It depends very much on the light type, frequency and brightness, but most LEDs, which most digital clocks use, tend to have an overgleaming effect, which makes them unreadable due to being a block of light.

> Not to mention, how often are you in a situation where you want to know what time it is, but the nearest clock is far enough away that it being analogue becomes an actual advantage?

All the time? Being in a train station, sitting in a (class)room (during exam), in the kitchen, walking on the street, etc.

Re: Kids Rarely Read Whole Books Anymore. Even in English Class

#308

Post by BeFlatXIII »

UncleMeat wrote: post #302
Spivak wrote: post #301

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes and literature is a pretty bad way to teach critical analysis. My high school did political speeches from history and that segment was infinitely more enjoyable than The Scarlet Letter. You can just teach the thing you want to teach.

Sure, and there are plenty of classes that use different written forms for their pedagogy. An advantage of novels is that their length often allows for different thematic depth and complexity and their narrative can make it easier to hold a reader's attention through that length.

The problems with teaching symbolism using novels are:

1. Novels considered “curriculum-approved literature” often have symbolism that is irrelevant to a student’s life. It was placed there intentionally by the author, and was blatant to all readers when it was published, but it is indistinguishable to a student from the teacher making things up.

2. Teachers who aren't the best end up teaching from a “it's true because it's true” mindset, which may as well be “because I made it up and said so.” These are quite common.

3. Or the teacher draws from a pool of stock symbolic and thematic answers for all novels. Astute students will spot that immediately and treat it as a game of guessing the teacher’s answer rather than engaging with the text.

Re: Kids Rarely Read Whole Books Anymore. Even in English Class

#309

Post by BeFlatXIII »

Telaneo wrote: post #177
Ekaros wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Makes me wonder is wrong question been asked. Shouldn't it first be why were curtains described in first place?

Probably a better question, atleast for a wide variety of books. Some authors however are very into writing detailed descriptions of places because that's how their brains work and what their readers enjoy, but 95% of those descriptions have nothing to do with anything that happens later in the book, other than hiding the one tiny detail that actually does become relevant. If 'why are the curtains blue' were consiste…

> 95% of those descriptions have nothing to do with anything that happens later in the book, other than hiding the one tiny detail that actually does become relevant

The foundation of the mystery novel.

Re: Kids Rarely Read Whole Books Anymore. Even in English Class

#310

Post by watwut »

eudamoniac wrote: post #174
smelendez wrote: post #163

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is it an aversion to assigning homework? I remember teachers assigning “read chapters 4-6 by Thursday” and then giving a quiz to make sure people read and remembered the details.

It's an aversion to giving bad grades to the inevitable bulk of students who just won't read it.

There is no real way for teacher to check whether I read the book or not. People who read books regularly fail trivia tests and people who did not read them can quick read "about the book" analysis off web and call it a day.

And crutially, my inclination to finish assigned book and my willingness to read books in general are unrelated. A kid that reads a lot wont neceasary enjoy and finish assigned books - I know I skipped quite a lot of them.

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