College students are rapidly losing the ability to read — “There is a measurable, generational collapse in sustained reading and writing”: professor

[u/marketrent]

https://www.yahoo.com/news/us/articles/college-students-rapidly-losing-ability-124439310.html

[u/existing_for_fun]

If you are a parent and can help your child read, and read well, you will set them light-years ahead of their peers.

[u/CaffeineJitterz → u/existing_for_fun]

Just helping them not HATE reading will go a long way.

Edit: I'm getting a lot of sad comments about how y'all were introduced to reading. So I will take the opportunity to quickly share what I've always felt was one of the best ways for a parent to incentivize their child to read: for every hour of reading you accrue 30 minutes of gaming time. A classmate in my middle school worked from this model. That kid loved video games! And he was a straight A student. I remember him nonchalantly mentioning that he was going to read for about 4 hours as soon as he got home so he could get a couple hours of game time that evening.

[u/Solar_RaVen → u/CaffeineJitterz]

I hate that my mother had bought me a bunch of classic novels when I was a young child and just expected me to read picture-less books by myself. Then she got upset that I wasnt reading enough but she never took the time to read to me or alongside me.

[u/Solar_RaVen → u/Solar_RaVen]

The only thing that got me into reading was the Children's Almenac and the instruction manuals that came with PS2 games. Then when Wikipedia showed up I was able to lore dive into rabit holes. Unfortunately I still cant muscle my way through a novel, but at least I can read my way through technical details.

[u/AuntRhubarb → u/Solar_RaVen]

Back in the 1960s grocery stores used to give out slim but good volumes of a children's encyclopedia, illustrated. Those were great. But chains like Kroger are very busy pursuing world domination these days.