My husband and I recently watched Harry Potter 20th Anniversary: Return to Hogwarts. Seeing young children excitedly standing in line to purchase the books in the series, some of which are over 700 pages long, reminded me of how much J.K. Rowling did to re-energize the reading appetite in our youth.
Fast forward twenty years . . . most of our high school students are now not reading anything for their personal enjoyment. They are not reading the news or books. Despite enrollment in AP Literature, AP Language, AP US History, AP Psychology, and AP Whatever, they are not reading their textbook chapters. Instead, they are navigating AP courses by using easy access to worksheet answers from an array of internet sources. They will spend an inordinate amount of time seeking a cheat sheet for assignments, if necessary, because (1) it is easier and (2) if they attempt to do the work independently, they may get a lower grade. They use Sparknotes and Schmoop in lieu of reading chapters for English class, too. They are largely unable to read an article and comprehend its contents. The American Psychological Association’s research reveals that over 80% of high school students today do not read for pleasure, but I believe the percentage of nonreaders is much higher than cited or even than we can imagine. In my opinion, we have a reading crisis, and that crisis is worsening.
In response to students’ failure to embrace reading assignments, teachers, frustrated by the number of students who fail to produce independent work, adjust expectations by minimizing reading assignments, which, in turn, serves to affirm the students’ avoidance. Meanwhile, parents either fail to appreciate the severity of their children’s reading problems, ignore them, or tire of the battle to force them to read.
We see the signs, though, that our children are not reading. They fail reading quizzes. For example, despite a string of high assessment grades, our children score a 40% on a pop reading quiz or even on an assigned reading quiz and offer up excuses, including the common “everyone failed it” justification, which is largely true. Our children’s lowest scores in standardized testing are often in the reading sections. Our children never come to the dinner table to share something interesting that they have read, and we never see our children with a magazine or novel in their hands.
Producing a generation of nonreaders has a huge ripple effect. Colleges are now pushing students through their curricula because so many students are poor readers, and if students cannot read, they cannot write. Moreover, our country’s current issues with widespread misinformation only worsen in the presence of nonreaders.
We know that the pandemic has exacerbated this already debilitating problem. Like never before, our children turn to gaming, social media, TikTok, and streaming for entertainment. They lose hours daily to these sources, and their brains, which should be actively searching, solving, imagining, and digesting information and storylines, instead idly respond in near-comatose fashion to screen time.
We as parents must redirect our children to embrace reading by putting a book in their hands or their ears. If they like video games, your children will likely enjoy reading fantasy, dystopian, or sci-fi novels such as the Legend series by Marie Lu, Ready Player One by Ernest Cline, the Throne of Glass series by Sarah J. Maas, Children of Blood and Bone by Tomi Adeyemi, or Ender’s Game by Orson Scott Card. If your children enjoy sports, they could escape with Boys in the Boat by Daniel James Brown, Beartown by Frederik Backman, Seabiscuit: An American Legend by Laura Hillenbrand, or Born to Run: A Hidden Tribe, Superathletes, and the Greatest Race the World Has Never Seen by Christopher McDougall. If your children enjoy streaming CSI or murder mysteries, I recommend The Secret History by Donna Tartt, The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time by Mark Haddon, or classics, such as Dan Brown’s Angels and Demons, John Grisham’s The Firm, or Agatha Christie’s And Then There Were None. If your children enjoy romance or drama, they might try Eleanor & Park by Rainbow Rowell, I’ll Give You the Sun by Jandy Nelson, Looking for Alaska by John Green, The Love Hypothesis by Ali Hazelwood, or The Princess Bride by William Goldman. If they enjoy the outdoors, consider Hatchet by Gary Paulsen, A Walk in the Woods by Bill Bryson, or My Side of the Mountain by Jean Craighead George. Finally, if your children enjoy history, seek out The Boy in the Striped Pajamas by John Boyne, Code Name Verity by Elizabeth Wein, or Between Shades of Gray by Ruda Sepetys. My personal favorite book of last year was Project Hail Mary by Andy Weir, which is simultaneously funny, heart-warming, and scientifically smart. The choices abound. While we have fewer young adult readers, we have abundant great literature and compelling nonfiction titles available.
Choose a surefire hit, first and foremost, because we want to sell reading to our children, with a word of warning: research the title with your children to ensure their buy-in and consider beginning with an audiobook for family consumption. Audiobooks are a great gateway drug.
The reading crisis is much more fixable than climate change or political divisiveness. We can reinspire our children to read. Let’s get to it.