Tonight the street outside is dark and quiet. The inside of the house is dark and quiet, too. The power has been out for a long time. As I read a chapter of my book with my flashlight, I feel the Ghost of Reading quietly wafting past me with her brother the Ghost of Thought. Then they are gone quickly into the ephemeral night…
When our professor assigned Neil Postman’s book Amusing Ourselves to Death* many years ago, we, all future reading specialists, laughed at the preposterous thought that we were about to witness the death of reading. Hmmm–now, not so much.
We know that 40% of Americans did not read even one book last year. We’ve all seen the crazed sports fans who spent thousands of dollars for championship playoff tickets but sat in the stands with eyes glued to… their cell phones. I have witnessed a woman crossing a busy street at lunchtime, not looking up from her phone for even one second until she reached the opposite curb. Neil Postman was very prescient—we are about to “entertain” ourselves to death.
The problem is, with the loss of deep reading, the process of critical thinking goes with it. Shifts from rational, long-form books to short bursts of texts, TikTok, and Instagram videos have led to children and adults who have no patience with ideas that are complex or require more than a half minute of reading. Long-time teachers are acutely aware of the decline in student attention span.
Reading longer text demands… thinking. Our society is quickly becoming uninformed. Cognitive scientists know that the brain learns what it practices. Short-text worksheets on logic and reasoning will not suffice in our classrooms. Analyzing character traits and motivation in both fiction and non-fiction books, exploring the sequence of events with causes and effects, understanding the factors that go into a general picture or main idea, (nationalism, for example) are important to everyone. Ideas from Chapter 4 influence events and ideas in Chapter 24. This post does not even touch upon the effects of AI, which is another serious problem.
The erosion of empathy and the insight into another person’s fear, grief, joy, or family that is evoked when reading books is also an important loss. Long-term reading gives insight into others’ feelings and problems, some of which might never have occurred to the reader. Maybe in the night, the little sister, the Ghost of Empathy, drifted past me, too.
The literate and the illiterate have equal votes in a democracy. An authoritarian who has all simple answers might be preferred to a thoughtful person who will think critically and sensitively about our national problems.
There is a reason more than 50%** of eighth graders don’t read on grade level, and it’s not that teachers aren’t teaching reading skills. Most students are not practicing the longer forms of the reading and critical thinking skills our democracy needs. See my previous post:
One of the few effective methods of helping students to be engaged with books and critical thinking is left to… teachers. Please don’t give up! Demand that students read books (whole class, or individual choice) often, weekly or monthly, depending on age. Try read alouds–they can work with any age. I’ve done it. Most parents are still on board with insisting that their children read teacher-assigned books. Heck, they WANT their children off the cell phone, but they need the support of teachers in demanding it. A coalition of parents and teachers? Imagine that!
For Reading Spotlight’s FREE packet of ideas for independent reading, download
in the
Teachers assigning the reading of books will contribute to a rebirth, rather than death, of reading, thinking, and empathy.
Happy Halloween!
*Postman, Neil. (1985) Amusing Ourselves to Death. Viking Penguin.
@Reading Spotlight 2026