The changing nature of reading

Tim Lauer twittered a fascinating NYTimes article, “Literacy Debate: Online R U Really Reading?” about the changing nature of reading that our students are doing. As students do more and more of their reading online, as the article posits, (based on various research studies), how are we adapting our instruction/reading programs/”novel” assignments to account for this?
And do we need to?
The article notes that:

“As teenagers’ scores on standardized reading tests have declined or stagnated, some argue that the hours spent prowling the Internet are the enemy of reading — diminishing literacy, wrecking attention spans and destroying a precious common culture that exists only through the reading of books.

But others say the Internet has created a new kind of reading, one that schools and society should not discount. The Web inspires a teenager like Nadia, who might otherwise spend most of her leisure time watching television, to read and write.”

I find the article fascinating, yet a little troubling and it raises quite a few questions for me. As a reader(not just a librarian) who really values the indepth way that ideas can unfold in book, I wonder what is missing if students aren’t readers of long texts in the same way that generations before them have been? What does it do for us as readers as we spend days or weeks listening to one author unfold a set of ideas or a storyline–as we have time to think about it on the “back burner”?

What does that more leisurely pace, that more in-depth reading, afford us as thinkers? And do we think about online texts in the same way–or are we just patching together a set of unrelated “glimpses” of ideas?

But I also strongly believe in the value of the kind of reading online that students (and many of us now) are doing. We can investigate things we are curious about easily, share ideas with one another across a vast network, follow the serendipity of a thread of information, and create texts of our own.
So my question is, where do these findings leave us? What should we be doing differently?
  • Trying to engage students more in printed texts?
  • Engaging more with the types of online texts they may already be reading?
  • Teaching more evaluative skills?
  • Teaching more “connections” between texts–so that whether students are reading online or offline they are focused on how things connect to one another?
  • Helping students slow down sometimes in their reading so as to have the “back burner” time to ponder things?
  • Creating a mixture of methods for students to engage in all sorts of texts by bringing them into connection with printed texts via online tools?
What do you think?

14 thoughts on “The changing nature of reading

  1. Carolyn,

    Your last post, Serendipity, provides a nice seque into my comment here. I have been having conversations regarding the very questions you bring up here, but in terms of how we actually research v. the traditional high school research paper. Just as it is appropriate to look at how we read now, it is equally fitting that we look at how we ask our students to conduct research.

    Our research guidelines, although written in 2005, make no mention of how to accurately assess the credibility of online resources (non-database). That is an issue for me in light of teenagers like Nadia from the article above. Our practices should reflect how to help the Nadia’s of the world attack what we read online.

    Additionally, I echo your concern about deep reading and long-texts; it’s extremely important that we not only find tools to help students think deeply about what they read, but also to be able to handle multiple mediums when conducting research. School is not always about studying the things you like, it’s about being introduced to things you might not otherwise have known about.

    Where this goes will be interesting; I am bringing together some of my English teachers in the next few weeks to see if we can take what was already written and revise it. It will be an interesting push and pull.

  2. These are great ideas. I have been thinking about this a lot in the past months. I put some ideas into a couple of blog posts.

    Getting Away From the Endless Hunt
    http://wanderings.edublogs.org/2008/05/26/getting-away-from-the-endless-hunt/

    Literacy techniques – the same for print and online?
    http://wanderings.edublogs.org/2008/07/03/literacy-techniques-the-same-for-print-and-online/

    I too worry that we are “patching together a set of unrelated “glimpses” of ideas”.

    And I think the answer is time. Creating situations where students must take the time to study their patchwork of information, think about it, go back and read the surrounding context more thoroughly etc. This might mean fewer research projects – but more in-depth, with frequent check-points where teachers and librarians question students and demand more thought….more reading and less skimming.

  3. Another:
    Mixing focused reading with student collaboration and writing – a dynamic process of all three skills.

    Great post and reference to article.

  4. Patrick,

    What you say–“Just as it is appropriate to look at how we read now, it is equally fitting that we look at how we ask our students to conduct research” is very true. We need to be mindfully thinking about what we are doing as far as how we are teaching/scaffolding the research process.

    I find it varies from assignments like “just go google it” to assignments that are using a mixture of old/new tools and methods, to assignments that are structured around tools of the past and rigid structures.

    and Jackie, what you said here is spot on–
    “And I think the answer is time. Creating situations where students must take the time to study their patchwork of information, think about it, go back and read the surrounding context more thoroughly etc.”

    I think this is one of the most neglected pieces in research as it happens in schools. Often, the element of time is not built into the project–which automatically makes it less authentic. In real life, our research and thinking evolves over time.

    We need to provide some “gap time” in a process for that ‘back burner’ thinking. And you are right that sometimes that may mean doing a little less as far as “coverage” but allowing for more depth.

    There has got to be a balance between break-neck ‘coverage’ of content and time for reflection and deep understanding, I think.

    And I do think the transformative nature of online access is that coverage becomes a little less important, and the ability to piece things together, evaluate, and reflect becomes much more important to how our students function in the world.

  5. I spend a lot of time chasing comment threads and links between weblogs. The web itself has become an information processing tool with search an imposing adjunct to information exchange.
    What little I have watched my kids get up to on Facebook ( I haven’t taken the plunge ) and quips I have received from social communities makes me think that often the appointed evaluators of successful information transfer have their virtual ‘hands’ full keeping track of the real evolution of information processing as a community project. I know teachers/librarians have a wonderful and growing access to Web 2.0. Keeping ahead of the gestalt is tough.
    Have a look at this for an example of what I mean
    http://www.internetnews.com/webcontent/article.php/3769056/Sarah+Palin+Vetting+the+Potential+Veep+WebWide.htm

  6. Carolyn,

    I think this may be THE issue of education now. What is literacy anymore? I really like the two quotes you chose which show BOTH sides of the issue. It ties in with “multi-tasking”. Can kids really do it or are they just doing more things poorly.

    Lately I have been reading and thinking about the right brain more. The tie in is that the right brain that Daniel Pink says is becoming more and more important is the side of the brain that needs TIME and sees the WHOLE picture. I think probably that leisurely deep thinking and has something to do with the right brain. If so, we are missing something by not helping kids develop that as well.

    Janice

  7. ı agree with the idea that internet has created a new kind of readin.ın Turkey we try to make the students read few pages in a book in our lessons for fifteen minutes at the beginning of the lessons but they don’t want to read.I urge them to read but it doesn’t work.nowadays there is a study in our school.We want our students to study Englisn on net.many of them are happy to read and study on net.they progress in using many different new english words.I also love reading on net.ı read many short stories thanks to the net.ı can find easily what ı want to learn.

  8. Getting students to read their textbooks is hard. Getting them to read books just for the sheer pleasure of reading is especially harder since kids just don’t seem to be interested in reading these days. Gone are the days when kids curled up with a nice little book when it was too hot to play outside. Today, students spend any free time they have watching TV, going to the mall, tinkering with their mobile phones or playing video games.
    The fact that students reap great benefits from reading cannot be doubted or questioned. It is for this reason that teachers must instill in students a real love for reading and groom them into becoming lifelong readers.

  9. “As teenagers’ scores on standardized reading tests have declined or stagnated, some argue that the hours spent prowling the Internet are the enemy of reading — diminishing literacy, wrecking attention spans and destroying a precious common culture that exists only through the reading of books.

    But others say the Internet has created a new kind of reading, one that schools and society should not discount. The Web inspires a teenager like Nadia, who might otherwise spend most of her leisure time watching television, to read and write.”

    That is really true,I THİNK THAT READİNG İS REALLY SO İMPORTANT FOR OUR development.But day by day,with the technologic tools,the numbers of reader is reduce. For instance,I always want to read something but I haven’t read that I want yet.Beacuse,I am so bussy during the day and I have any spare time for reading something.When I go to my home I only want to sleep because I know tomorrow is hard day and I must be strong for next day.

  10. In fact, the students are not made aware of reading strategies while they are learning “reading” skill in their first language. Then, expecting the students to use these strategies while reading in second language is an unrealistic aim. Mostly, most students already use reading strategies unconsciously, but to have students acquire and us the reading strategies consciously may help them to become more eager and systematic readers.

  11. I agree that the nature of reading is changing as time passes. This stems from that the aims and needs of the students are changing.In my classes I observe that students do reading uncounciously and quicly.They don’t concantrate on the text on the whole ; instead they prefer to read the first or the last sentences or paragraphs because they are thougt and taught that main idea is found in the first or the last sentences or paragraphs.I think students have the right to do so because in the exams for high school or university this method is used in the questions related to passages whether in English or Turkish.Students focus on the first or the last paragraphs while they are passing the other parts quicly as the time limited in the exams.To sum up, I think that students tend to generalize this and it becomes tediuos for them to read an article, a book ,a magazine for several pages.Reading to skim becomes the only method for students ;as a result they don’t want to read a story or a novel taking too much time.

  12. Having read both the article and the comments above, I agree with my colleagues on the fact that the nature of reading has changed. Not all but most of the students no longer have been crazy about reading. Most of them prefer on-line reading which is faster, without deep thinking. As far as I observe my students, only a few of them read much, twenty books a month. In order to motivate them to read more we have organized awards for those who read more in a month.However, this worked for most of them but some students have still been uninterested, mostly the ones who spends much time on the net. Keeping this fact in mind, I should indicate that we should create a mixture of methods for students to engage in all sorts of texts by bringing them into connection with printed texts via online tools so that we will address to both type of readers.

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