Reading In Action
Two articles on similar topics and what to do next...
A friend sent me an article from The Atlantic this week. The headline alarmed me.
The headline: “The End of Reading Is Here”
In case you can’t access the link I shared above because of a paywall, in the article, the headline is in all caps.
Alarming, indeed.
Of course, a headline like that makes even the most anti-reading non-reader stop and read it.
And I guess that’s the point. It’s a long article, but definitely worth your time.
The author, Rose Horowitch, made some great points. I’d like to highlight a few and then share another article by a reading educator that will circle back around and connect a few dots with posts I published a few weeks ago. Stay with me.
These are quotes from Rose’s article that alarmed me the most:
“Faced with shrinking attention spans and declining comprehension, schools might have been expected to resist the impulse toward shorter passages and shallower reading. Instead, they spurred it on. A 2025 survey found that most middle- and high-school English teachers assigned zero to four books a year. Successive waves of education reforms have led districts to favor short passages over full books, the better to mimic multiple-choice reading-comprehension exams. Many of the most popular school curricula now rely on excerpts. Annemarie Cortez, the principal at an elementary school in Corona, California, told me that many administrators are instructing teachers not to assign full books; they’re supposed to be running discrete reading drills with short excerpts.”
“Reading books is a workout for the attention span. The more you read, the easier it is to read, and the more you’re rewarded with new understanding. Eventually, the process is more pleasurable than it is challenging. But as with physical exercise, the converse is true as well: The less you read, the more difficult it is to read, and the rockier the path to acquiring knowledge.”
Yup, you read that right. A 2025 survey found that most middle school and high school English teachers assigned zero to four books a year. Let that sink in for a minute. Students are either reading 0, zilch, nada books in school or at most 4. 4!
That deeply hurts my heart. And if teachers are now encouraged to only provide summaries or short passages as a form of test prep, that’s not reading. That’s a testing strategy. That’s learning to take a test. That’s not reading a book. And that’s certainly not critical thinking or deep analysis.
I agree with the second quote. Reading a book is truly a workout for the attention span. And just like physical exercise, you have to practice.
Again, this article is worth a read. Rose highlights great stats about reading decline, the history of reading, literacy, and oral storytelling, and touches on AI. But her rhetoric is consistent with her alarmist headline; it’s a reading doomsday article.
As I’ve noted before, I’m more of a “okay, here’s the problem; now what do we do about it” kind of gal. Rose doesn’t offer any solutions. That’s not good enough for me.
That’s where the second article I found this week comes in. This one offers up a plan of action. My kind of article. ;)
The author of this other article, this time from Ed Week, Carol Jago, asks a great question to start: “How can we turn the page on this failed reading strategy?” (The failed reading strategy would be only reading excerpts and summaries, exactly what Rose’s article talks about. It’s like these articles were having a conversation with one another).
Her answer: It’s time to bring back WHOLE books.
Preach. Yes, let’s start reading whole books in schools again.
Ahh, this is where I circle back to a post I published a few weeks back. Bringing back whole books into the classroom isn’t about some kind of intense curriculum change or instructional practice. From what I gather from this article, it’s about creating the best conditions for reading to happen. Sound familiar? If you’ve been following along, I posted several articles about this suggestion, which came from Brian Bannon, the head librarian at New York City’s Public Library. To quote him again:
“But teaching people to read and building a world where they can do so are different problems. Throwing our phones in the lake can’t bring about that world, but designing the conditions for reading will.”
Eureka! Carol from the Ed Week article has thoughts on how teachers and school leaders can pave the way in creating the conditions for reading:
Make time and space inside the school day for reading. This might require scheduling extended time in English/language arts classes.
Provide easy access to a wide range of books and encourage reading beyond the school day. Invest in classroom libraries full of contemporary titles. Invite students to take books home over school breaks.
Allow for student choice in what they read (and show them how to choose). Talk with students about how they can select a book to read. Is it an author they liked, a genre they enjoy, a compelling cover?
Articulate to students what the classics have to teach us. Draw connections between the themes in the books we teach and the issues students care about—for example, how we all have great expectations like Charles Dickens’ Pip or how we are all on a journey to self-discovery like Odysseus.
Talk about the books you are reading. Students need to hear teachers, administrators, and librarians talk about how they select, and sometimes reject, their next book.
Make classwide conversations about books a daily occurrence. Explore how to make literature circles and Socratic seminars successful classroom routines.
Help students set their own reading goals. Invite students to keep a list of books they have read, along with a list of books that they look forward to reading.
Create a summer reading program that students want to participate in. Include students on the committee that designs the program. When students take part in decision-making, they become invested in its success.
She also makes the point that disaffection for school work is not new. Duh. Students not wanting to do school work is a tale as old as time. But do you know what is new?
Carol says, “What is new is the cognitive impatience that so many young people exhibit. Hours scrolling—skimming and scanning—on a cellphone has atrophied the reading muscles. Rather than giving in to a gamification of curriculum, we need to dig in and show students how persevering through a whole book can help build their stamina for thinking through complex arguments. Books teach readers to suspend judgment and wait for further developments. They are unique vehicles for exploring what has been, what is, and what could be.”
Just like going to the gym consistently, reading whole books and creating reading conditions will build stamina. It takes practice and consistency. Now that’s reading in action.
What this all sounds like to me is that we need to go back to basics. To that foundational goodness of physical books and creating the conditions to read them.
Right now, in the face of all things digital, that feels rebellious.
Bummed out by the state of reading? No worries! Stay tuned for Sunday’s post. I’m spotlighting an honorary Reading Rebel who will give you some literary hope. ;)
What’s your opinion on audio books? As an adult I love listening to audio books while walking. I wonder how that would translate to a classroom where students go outside and walk while listening to books and come back for a group discussion, Socratic seminar? I was a high school teacher for 4 years, movement was always a part of lessons, like getting out of your seat to read and take notes that were on the walls around the room. I feel like so much of the education model is adults telling kids to sit down and listen to someone tell them what’s important and what they need to know to graduate.
I’m so glad you didn’t just stop with the problem but laid out solutions, too! It really is as simple as a cultural shift to celebrate the rebellion of picking up a book and reading. And that can only happen when books are as easily within grasp as our phones!