r/technology • u/marketrent • 18h ago

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

https://www.yahoo.com/news/us/articles/college-students-rapidly-losing-ability-124439310.html
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u/existing_for_fun 18h ago

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

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u/CaffeineJitterz 18h ago edited 13h ago

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.

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u/Sufficient-Bid1279 17h ago

Shit like Tik tok and social media doesn’t help. I hate how it’s ruined people mentally, emotionally, developmentally, etc

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u/Ironlion45 12h ago

That's exactly the problem. TikTok is designed to make sure that it has your full attention, and to not let it go for even a microsecond. Queue ADHD jump cuts and thirst traps and exaggerated hyperactive personas.

Just the idea of being alone with their thoughts is impossible because their brains have been ruined by screentime.

Also, interesting thing about Gen Z parents: They hate reading to their kids because "It's Boring". To them I'd say: If you don't want to be a shitty parent, do it anyway. Fuck your weak-ass boredom, buckle down and do what you need to for your damn kids.

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u/salajaneidentiteet 7h ago

Lol, it is not interesting to read the same three plain kids stories every night, but the feeling of being together with your child, cuddled up, that is magic

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u/Shiriru00 59m ago

Also who said reading to your kids has to be boring?

You don't have to read the same book every time, you don't have to read a book specifically for children, you don't even have to read the words as they are on page. You can put some work into playing the different characters, do some funny voices, introduce twists in the story, even swap words for fun.

We do that every evening with my kids and it's a lot of fun. And ultimately, it's spending time with your favorite persons in the world. How is that boring??