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July 18, 2008, 12:15 PM ET
Student Bibliophobes
At the end of last semester, I stood before my sophomore survey class, American lit from the Civil War to the present, and said, “Okay, it’s almost summer, the year’s almost over. I know most of you have put together summer reading lists, and let’s share them a little bit. Why don’t we go around the room and have each person give the top two titles.”
The response: Faces went blank and ashen. Mouths tightened up. Eyes lowered. Of course, none of the 75 kids in the room had thought about summer books to read. I expected as much, and so would anybody who takes a look at student surveys such as the National Survey of Student Engagement (at Indiana) and The American Freshman (at UCLA), which include questions about leisure reading. On the 2005 High School Survey of Student Engagement, 45 percent of respondents said that they didn’t think that leisure reading was important (“a little” or “not at all”).
The problem touches even the best schools. Here’s a piece in the Daily Princetonian that begins:
“In the last month, how many of you have read four books or more for your own pleasure?” I asked the students in my NES 201: Introduction to the Middle East precept. Bewildered eyes stared at me, but nobody raised a hand. “OK, so how about three books?” I persisted, but silence prevailed. When I got down to one, a student hesitantly admitted to have read something. That was one student in a class of 13 bright and promising undergraduates. The other classes I taught responded to this question similarly.”
More and more, an out-of-class book list seems to students like just another homework assignment. Perhaps they are so career-oriented that they don’t conceive of any intellectual growth independent of their coursework and resume building. Or perhaps the pull of the Facebook page, the buzz of the cell phone, the ding of an email coming in . . . they don’t allow for two hours of uninterrupted time with a book.
The costs to them later in life are heavy, I believe, and they put teachers in the uncomfortable position of finding ways not only of passing along knowledge and skills, but also instilling the conviction that reading beyond the immediate demands of school and work matters.
(Image uses elements of a photo from Photobucket.com and a photo by Flickr Creative Commons user ricoeurian)
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