
U.S. children read, but not well or often: report - kevin818
http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/05/12/us-usa-reading-idUSKBN0DS04L20140512
======
ap22213
Recently, I stopped over a friends house. And, I was surprised to see a group
of 7 or so 9-11 year olds all watching their computers or devices. At first I
thought they were having a lan party, playing a game. So, I asked them what
they were doing, and they said they were watching youtube videos. I observed
them for a while and watched as they'd go back and forth between each other,
sharing different links then sitting in silence, watching. Then, they'd get
together and talk about it. I'm not sure what they were looking up, but they
were all engrossed, sharing in some sort of learning experience.

I'm not sure if this is good or bad (who can really say?). But, I see it in my
son, who is 9. I get frustrated that he's not reading at the level I was, when
I was his age. And, we certainly have lots of books around the house and
encourage good reading habits. However, he likes his videos and audio.

Didn't Marshall McLuhan predict this back in the 60s? The 'book' as we know it
has only been around for a few hundred years. And, certainly it's been quite
important to our progress and exchange of information. But, information has
been communicated for thousands of years, in different means, with success.
I'm fairly optimistic that new generations will rely on different types of
communication to exchange ideas and to learn. Books will not be irrelevant,
but books (and reading) are being replaced, in importance. What will happen
when we re-evaluate all of our knowledge outside the context of the 'Gutenberg
mind'?

~~~
johnchristopher
> I'm not sure if this is good or bad (who can really say?).

Actually, there are many people who can say whether it's good or bad.

> Didn't Marshall McLuhan predict this back in the 60s? The 'book' as we know
> it has only been around for a few hundred years. And, certainly it's been
> quite important to our progress and exchange of information. But,
> information has been communicated for thousands of years, in different
> means, with success. I'm fairly optimistic that new generations will rely on
> different types of communication to exchange ideas and to learn. Books will
> not be irrelevant, but books (and reading) are being replaced, in
> importance. What will happen when we re-evaluate all of our knowledge
> outside the context of the 'Gutenberg mind'?

I suggest you pick up a copy of
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Shallows:_What_the_Internet...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Shallows:_What_the_Internet_Is_Doing_to_Our_Brains)
to broaden your outlook.

~~~
ap22213
What I mean is: who can predict the future?

The 'book' had certainly impacted the structure of Human thinking, and McLuhan
suggested that this resulted in things that weren't necessarily 'good' (maybe
some good? some bad?). Likewise, new technologies will again change the
structure of Human thinking. But, we can't presume to know how this will turn
out.

~~~
mephi5t0
Exactly, nobody can. When we were drawing in horse crap - a car was a life
saver. Now everyone complain it's killing us with cancer and drawing us in the
future melted ice caps. Nobody can tell what impact it will have on human
brains in 100 years... I deff know that watching cartoons all day is bad. And
a lot of parents do just that - here is an iPad, just shut up and let me be.
But if it used for study... Who knows?!

------
msluyter
It's not just kids. About 6 months ago, I started reading "Constellation
Games," a really fun and clever sci-fi novel. Yet it now sits on my desk about
2/3 complete. I didn't lose interest or anything -- I simply find it
increasingly difficult to set aside time for pleasure reading, for a variety
of reasons. Even though I enjoy long form reading, it's now something I have
to schedule and force myself to do.

I'm not sure whether I'm actually reading less in total (I don't believe so),
or simply whether reading novels has been displaced by reading, say, HN and
blogs. If _I_ find it difficult these days, I can't imagine how difficult it
might be for kids with (presumably) much shorter attention spans.

~~~
segmondy
We are reading more crap. I read tons of blogs, HN, reddit, and useless stuff
every day. Seems important, but not. We are overloaded with shallow
information. When I was young and there was no internet, getting access to
information, especially one with depth was a delight. It opened up a new
world, where your imagination went to work. Today, there are very few things
that wow and have my mind racing as it did when I was much younger. The same
applies to kids today, with TV/Internet they have somehow seen it all, even if
it's just at the surface level, so very few get drawn to dig in deeper.

~~~
sitkack
I find my active creativity is _much_ higher when reading well thought out
print material like the New Yorker, fiction OR non-fiction book. My mind races
with new creations and combinations. This rarely happens with online material
which favors the NOW instead of the good. One cannot subsist off of newspapers
and blogs along, they are deficient in all the nutrients the mind needs.

The thoughts are shallow and hurried with repetitive easy to digest truisms. A
single sentence expanded to fill an entire article.

Reading something deeply takes work. Writing it even more.

------
fiatmoney
Subtext:

"About 46 percent of white children are considered “proficient” in reading,
compared with 18 percent of black children and 20 percent of Hispanic kids.

Those gaps remained relatively unchanged over the past 20 years, according to
the report."

I.e., it's likely that the change in the average is driven by a change in the
proportions of the components, not a shift in the by-component means.

------
Beliavsky
Doesn't the following quote from the article contradict the title's assertion
that kids are not reading as well?

"Despite the large percentage of children with below-basic reading skills,
reading scores among young children have improved since the 1970s, according
to one test that measures reading ability.

The reading scores among 17-year-olds, however, remained relatively unchanged
since the 1970s."

~~~
sitkack
This should have been communicated in some sort of chart.

Maybe children are progressing at a slow rate in their earlier years but
making it to the same plateau as 17 year olds? Our reading proficiency might
have been more of a step function / trapezoid, arrived early and then grew
slowly, vs constant slower growth.

------
j2kun
Am I the only one that finds it ironic that this article is in the "one
sentence per paragraph" form that I tend to associate with _bad writing_ (or
perhaps writing aimed at people who don't read long form)? I imagine the
journalists are somewhat to blame for this. I'm looking at you, Buzzfeed.

~~~
dalacv
No.

------
127001brewer
According to Jim Trelease's book, "The Read-Outloud Handbook", one of the most
important things to with your kid is to read to them every night.[1] The book,
from what my recollection, discusses how students in other countries, such as
Finland, perform better overall because their parents tend to read to them
every night.

Even someone like Warren Buffet focuses on reading - spending "80 percent" of
his workday ready.[2]

1\. [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jim_Trelease#The_Read-
Aloud_Han...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jim_Trelease#The_Read-
Aloud_Handbook) 2\. [http://theweek.com/article/index/248655/the-warren-
buffett-f...](http://theweek.com/article/index/248655/the-warren-buffett-
formula-how-you-can-get-smarter)

------
Code_Poet
Even if YOU don't have children, this is a big deal—this essentially means a
highly-illiterate work force for the future. As an educator, I can read with
students in a classroom, have them read aloud, and even assign reading outside
of class (which they generally don't do, mind you), but it doesn't help if
adults and parents aren't making an effort to encourage by example.

If I'm a kid who wants to be a web developer one day, and I decide to follow
Paul Irish on Twitter, you had better bet your buttered biscuits it makes an
impact when Paul is doing nothing but tweeting links to industry articles left
and right. This goes beyond the simple need of just having mommy read you a
bedtime story...

~~~
zhemao
It would be worrying if reading ability was actually getting worse, but the
article mentions that this is not the case.

> Reading scores among young children have improved since the 1970s.

> The reading scores among 17-year-olds, however, remained relatively
> unchanged since the 1970s.

------
ensignavenger
The New York Times article on this study had a comment suggesting that kids
"text" but don't read. I thought it funny that the author thinks that kids
only write text messages, but don't ever read them!

Actually, this Reuters article touches on this:

"Rideout cautioned that there may be difference in how people encounter text
and the included studies may not take into account stories read online or on
social media."

And therein lies the problem with the study. Kids probably do more reading-
online, on social media, text messages and in video games.

Granted, the quality of writing encountered is likely substantially lower
(certainly a subjective claim), I think kids are probably reading a lot more
than this study suggests.

------
bryanlarsen
"Rideout cautioned that there may be difference in how people encounter text
and the included studies may not take into account stories read online or on
social media."

IOW, the study is completely invalid, but we'll report it anyways.

------
antidaily
_The reading scores among 17-year-olds, however, remained relatively unchanged
since the 1970s._

Interesting. At least they catch up.

Isn't this just another casualty of the war on public education and teaching
for these stupid common core tests?

~~~
watwut
Another quote: "... reading scores among young children have improved since
the 1970s, according to one test that measures reading ability. ..."

------
Xdes
I do not see the problem. I have never read books for pleasure. Most of the
books I own are technical or reference material that have practical
applications. Why would I want to read for pleasure? I did not find anything
interesting about The Catcher in the Rye, Lord of the Flies, or To Kill a
Mockingbird which were standard readings when I went to school. Maybe I do not
have the imaginative capacity like those people that "get lost" in books.

~~~
ronaldx
Story-telling is important for society.

It teaches us how people might react to situations we are not immediately
familiar with, and how to empathise with people (characters) who have a
different viewpoint than our own.

And, it teaches us how to communicate our own stories effectively (as you have
done here, in fact).

So, I find it strange that you have never enjoyed reading fiction books. It is
not necessary to read fiction to gain any particular skill, but reading
fiction helps you gain a wealth of skills.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Storytelling#Storytelling_and_...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Storytelling#Storytelling_and_learning)

~~~
the_af
It's true that story-telling is important for society, but I also find this
view a bit... utilitarian.

Story-telling and reading are important because they are enriching,
pleasurable activities; among the best there are, in fact. That they also make
you a better person is a welcome bonus.

~~~
JetSpiegel
It's really depressing that people are citing studies to justify reading
novels.

That's a story for the ages...

~~~
seren
At the age of Fitbit, Soylent, 4-hour work week, etc, and particularly on HN,
it seems you have to have some sort of reward or definite end-goal to partake
in any activity.

------
yp_all
Does the HN title accurately reflect the article? Was this a wordlwide study?
The title of the article is "U.S. children read, but not well or often:
report"

------
bluedino
its cuz of txtng

Not just texting, but it seems like any communication online is excused from
having to follow any sort of rules. People try to justify it in a sense of
'This is just how kids speak these days', but would any other field allow a
grotesque destruction of itself?

What's the lol-speak equivalent in math, science, or art?

~~~
VLM
"What's the lol-speak equivalent in math, science, or art?"

We should be proud no one mentioned Religion yet. Whoops.

------
brownbat
I'd really like to see a study of how many words are read by the average
person today vs. 30 years ago. Reading fewer novels may, but doesn't
necessarily, imply less reading overall.

------
nickthemagicman
In related news the sky is blue.

