This is a great article with many important and compelling points! But I think the most essential point is summed up in the last sentence: "...rather than a dirge of despair, we need a call to action—and that call should focus on schools, which are in a unique position to act."
I agree with all of this. My struggle is trying to teach reading in a school district that eliminated whole books from the reading curriculum. Instead, teachers are expected to teach a standardized program that favors textbook excerpts and comprehension questions over novel studies and building knowledge to improve reading comprehension.
I’m a retired English prof who has followed your work with great interest. One of the most poignant comments I ever received on a student evaluation was a note of thanks from a student who was happy to have finally read an entire book in college.
In the early 2010s, I taught both Bleak House and Infinite Jest with considerable success to garden-variety students in gen ed classes. Is it still possible? I want to hope so. I know that I spent about twice as much time — seven weeks — on BH as most prof apparently do.
My misgiving about the Atlantic article is that it too easily lends itself to surrender: we can’t ask our students to read these things, we have to meet them where they are, etc. It’s better to invite students in, I’d say, and offer them a map of the territory: You Are Here. The first seven paragraphs of BH are mighty difficult without some context.
Your insights are valuable and as an educator, I agree that teaching reading comprehension needs a revamp. Background knowledge is key to comprehension. Sadly, you left out the role parents should play in the development of reading books at home. If parents read to their children beginning in infancy, children would enter school with some of the basic background knowledge missing in today’s students. I have students who have no inkling of basic fairytales. They don’t know any nursery rhymes, or want to pick up a picture book. It takes the entire village to change course. Teachers and schools can’t do it alone.
All that, yes—and also I think it would really help to use some school time for independent reading. I have done this in my ninth grade classes for years (prompted by having 30% of the students in one of my classes admit that they hadn’t read a single whole book in middle school, despite being assigned them). We also do the usual whole class books and reading homework, etc—but this way I know they are *actually* reading for at least an hour a week!
Second the endorsement of "Amusing Ourselves to Death." Being entertained and "checking out" vs being thoughtfully engaged is a cutural shift which is hard to push back against.
I, too, read the Atlantic piece on "The End of Reading," and laughed as I also read Timothy Noah's reaction on The Atlantic's penchant for "End-of-ism" articles. But I was delighted that the Atlantic piece highlighted the work of Neil Postman, who predicted all this back in the 1980s. Not sure which book of his to recommend more highly, Amusing Ourselves to Death or or --cue the "end of" -- "The Disappearance of Childhood" or "The End of Education." The latter is meant to have a double meaning. Less about the collapse of education and more on the purpose--or ends/goals-- of education. I'm still optimistic about the role that education can play if we only refocus on knowledge building and learning.
I read the Atlantic article this week and appreciate your response and optimistic reflections. I have two daughters. One about to enter middle school at a public school. Another is going into fourth grade at a Catholic school. The latter still teaches cursive, whole book reading, and grammar. While there is a lot to appreciate about both schools, I am curious to see how these differences affect their interest and ability to read and write going into high school.
Thank you for this article. I just published a whole article about how I incorporate whole class novel reads in my classroom in order to combat this issue. I read aloud the novel which makes room for discussion, understanding, and they get to see what reading and thinking looks like through my modeling of reading the book to them. It works! My students are given permission to allow books to truly make them feel things. It’s amazing to watch. https://therealclassroom.substack.com/p/yes-i-read-the-whole-novel-to-my?r=3msitm&utm_medium=ios
I remember I really fell in love with Island of the Blue Dolphin which I read in the fourth grade.
By 6th grade I was reading Tarzan by Edgar Rice Burroughs.
So yes I do think schools can help create a love of reading
I now have over 1,000 books on the kindle, and the shelves are stuffed with books
Recently, though I did go back and reread tarzan, it's amazing how much more difficult those older books are then newer stuff that's put out. We really have dumbed things down.
Still, I think the most important thing is finding books that the kids will like reading. They should be exciting and action packed
In the class I taught last spring--a required liberal arts seminar at a small women's college--I had to change direction halfway through the semester and spend much more time in line-by-line analysis. It drove me crazy at first but the students really improved. Still, I may have to give up teaching longer novels, and switch to shorter texts. Emily Dickinson, maybe?
No, journalists do trawl Substack for ideas. It happens in other fields of journalism too. They see what plays with an audience before investing the time to (re)write what they find.
This is a great article with many important and compelling points! But I think the most essential point is summed up in the last sentence: "...rather than a dirge of despair, we need a call to action—and that call should focus on schools, which are in a unique position to act."
I agree with all of this. My struggle is trying to teach reading in a school district that eliminated whole books from the reading curriculum. Instead, teachers are expected to teach a standardized program that favors textbook excerpts and comprehension questions over novel studies and building knowledge to improve reading comprehension.
I’m a retired English prof who has followed your work with great interest. One of the most poignant comments I ever received on a student evaluation was a note of thanks from a student who was happy to have finally read an entire book in college.
In the early 2010s, I taught both Bleak House and Infinite Jest with considerable success to garden-variety students in gen ed classes. Is it still possible? I want to hope so. I know that I spent about twice as much time — seven weeks — on BH as most prof apparently do.
My misgiving about the Atlantic article is that it too easily lends itself to surrender: we can’t ask our students to read these things, we have to meet them where they are, etc. It’s better to invite students in, I’d say, and offer them a map of the territory: You Are Here. The first seven paragraphs of BH are mighty difficult without some context.
Your insights are valuable and as an educator, I agree that teaching reading comprehension needs a revamp. Background knowledge is key to comprehension. Sadly, you left out the role parents should play in the development of reading books at home. If parents read to their children beginning in infancy, children would enter school with some of the basic background knowledge missing in today’s students. I have students who have no inkling of basic fairytales. They don’t know any nursery rhymes, or want to pick up a picture book. It takes the entire village to change course. Teachers and schools can’t do it alone.
All that, yes—and also I think it would really help to use some school time for independent reading. I have done this in my ninth grade classes for years (prompted by having 30% of the students in one of my classes admit that they hadn’t read a single whole book in middle school, despite being assigned them). We also do the usual whole class books and reading homework, etc—but this way I know they are *actually* reading for at least an hour a week!
Second the endorsement of "Amusing Ourselves to Death." Being entertained and "checking out" vs being thoughtfully engaged is a cutural shift which is hard to push back against.
I, too, read the Atlantic piece on "The End of Reading," and laughed as I also read Timothy Noah's reaction on The Atlantic's penchant for "End-of-ism" articles. But I was delighted that the Atlantic piece highlighted the work of Neil Postman, who predicted all this back in the 1980s. Not sure which book of his to recommend more highly, Amusing Ourselves to Death or or --cue the "end of" -- "The Disappearance of Childhood" or "The End of Education." The latter is meant to have a double meaning. Less about the collapse of education and more on the purpose--or ends/goals-- of education. I'm still optimistic about the role that education can play if we only refocus on knowledge building and learning.
I read the Atlantic article this week and appreciate your response and optimistic reflections. I have two daughters. One about to enter middle school at a public school. Another is going into fourth grade at a Catholic school. The latter still teaches cursive, whole book reading, and grammar. While there is a lot to appreciate about both schools, I am curious to see how these differences affect their interest and ability to read and write going into high school.
My call to action would be to help the one (measurably) at the back of the class who has a reading disablity and work from there.
Thank you for this article. I just published a whole article about how I incorporate whole class novel reads in my classroom in order to combat this issue. I read aloud the novel which makes room for discussion, understanding, and they get to see what reading and thinking looks like through my modeling of reading the book to them. It works! My students are given permission to allow books to truly make them feel things. It’s amazing to watch. https://therealclassroom.substack.com/p/yes-i-read-the-whole-novel-to-my?r=3msitm&utm_medium=ios
I remember I really fell in love with Island of the Blue Dolphin which I read in the fourth grade.
By 6th grade I was reading Tarzan by Edgar Rice Burroughs.
So yes I do think schools can help create a love of reading
I now have over 1,000 books on the kindle, and the shelves are stuffed with books
Recently, though I did go back and reread tarzan, it's amazing how much more difficult those older books are then newer stuff that's put out. We really have dumbed things down.
Still, I think the most important thing is finding books that the kids will like reading. They should be exciting and action packed
I'm not letting my students use devices in class this fall, and all their work will be done in composition books. Pray for me.
In the class I taught last spring--a required liberal arts seminar at a small women's college--I had to change direction halfway through the semester and spend much more time in line-by-line analysis. It drove me crazy at first but the students really improved. Still, I may have to give up teaching longer novels, and switch to shorter texts. Emily Dickinson, maybe?
good article. I hope it will be a wakeup call to schools.
No, journalists do trawl Substack for ideas. It happens in other fields of journalism too. They see what plays with an audience before investing the time to (re)write what they find.