OPINION

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By James Galgano

The haunting exploration of true human nature in Lord of the Flies. The examination of the effect of wealth on morality within The Great Gatsby. The representation of corrupt revolutions through satirical symbolism in Animal Farm. The classics of high school English class curricula represent important aspects of human existence and society and—you don’t care? Yeah, that checks out. 

Becoming an avid reader is one of the most important skills that school can teach you, but there are imperfections to this process. Often when we are younger, reading for “pleasure” is encouraged as a way to advance reading levels or tick a box on your Reading Log. If reading becomes a forced routine, however, the desire to read outside of the classroom drops, according to the Journal of Research in Education. The foundation of reading development in early education can determine whether or not an individual will choose to read once they are no longer required to do so. 

Brothers reading together in a field. Photo credit: user “Vika-R” on Pixabay.

The continuation of reading throughout life can have significant positive mental and academic effects. The Competent Learners at 14 Project, a study of around 500 students based in New Zealand, concluded that students with a greater appreciation for reading made better interpersonal relationships and had both higher scores and more motivation in school. Separate research done by the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development found that “interest in reading is a much more important prerequisite for acquiring skills than having a parent who holds a higher education degree.”

Evidently, the consensus is that pleasure reading advances early childhood development, but the ways in which school promotes reading serves the opposite purpose—around 84 percent of adolescent students no longer read on a daily basis, according to the American Psychological Association. 

In contrast, the average screen time for adolescents has risen to 7.5 hours per day—or around 114 days per year—according to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention. However, the age group that has experienced a rise in screen time along with a significant decrease in pleasure reading is actually senior citizens aged 65 or older. Although adolescents’ screen time has increased, their time spent reading for pleasure has stayed about the same for the past decade.

Graphs showing the negative correlation between TV watching and pleasure reading. Image credit: American Time Use Survey via The Washington Post.

Students at Collegiate School have many reasons for why they no longer read for pleasure. Some students argue that the choice of assigned books in English classes contribute to their displeasure. Upper School student George Byford (‘25) argued that “the books we read in school aren’t pleasure books … which ends up spoiling reading for me, because I only picture [reading] as a thing I do for school.” Fellow classmate Anne Randall Berkeyheiser (‘25) added, “some of the books I read in school aren’t particularly interesting, and also when I’m reading for school, my eyes get tired and my head hurts, and then I don’t want to do additional reading.” 

Other students explain that the amount of school work they have and the way school overtakes their lives discourages them from wanting to read in what little free time they have. Collegiate Junior Harper Cuttino (‘25) stated, “everything I do is surrounded by school; because it’s so much work that I don’t really have free time to do anything else that feels scholarly.” If students struggle to enjoy school, and associate reading with school, then they will have the same feelings towards both activities. Lily Stanwix (‘25) posed the question, “because of how much schoolwork they give us, when would I have time to read?” 

To students, school encouraging them to read in their free time, while at the same time being the reason they don’t feel motivated or have the time to read, seems overtly contradictory.

So if there are so many benefits to reading for pleasure, but there are so few students who continue to read independently through the duration of their education, then what is the solution? The responsibility of maintaining students’ love of reading often falls to teachers. 

Collegiate 4th Graders participating in a reading activity. Photo courtesy of Collegiate School.

English Department chair Dr. Will Dunlap agrees with students that part of the issue is the time they have to read. He offers two solutions: “Either you have to give space for free reading in class, which I’ve done in the past, or you give people who are already enjoying the process of reading time in their lives to read. And that’s not just an English problem: it’s a school problem.” Dr. Dunlap also believes that there is a disconnect between English reading and pleasure reading—he joked that no student is spending their leisure time annotating books for fun. 

Upper School English teacher and Match advisor Vlastik Svab shared how he structures his classes in order to keep students motivated and engaged in reading. He finds that book choice plays an important role in his classes’ attentiveness: “I really like teaching Lord of the Flies: it’s a good book to teach because it has action and adventure, so kids are interested in what is going to happen, but there’s also plenty of symbolism.” By choosing books that both “are relevant to the students” and also work for teaching specific English lessons, Svab tried to improve student disengagement and work towards rekindling an enjoyment of reading.

Written text has been the backbone of education within the world for thousands of years, but in the current age there must be effective ways to teach reading that don’t cause students resentment towards the subject. The first step in this process is simply to listen to what students have to say—not just the ones quoted within this article, but for every school to hear their students and adapt their teachings. If students are changing, then school must change with them and find ways to restore academic pleasure. Because despite writing this article and learning about the benefits, the act of picking up a book and reading it for fun is the last thing I would choose to do.

Featured image credit: Katerina Kucherenko on Pixabay.