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In this modern era, adult literacy has been of growing concern for school boards and employers alike that there are many standardized means of testing writing and reading comprehension of potential candidates. With each step we move in pursuit of more advanced technologies and enhanced social media experiences, many experts have come to wonder if we are detracting too much from our learned skills such as reading. Many teachers complain that it is in this era that the elders have failed to encourage reading from young age. The striking reality is that with all the technologies acting as a distraction even to adults, it is truly difficult to grab a child’s attention. According to the US Army Medical Department, a child entering kindergarten has an attention span of only fifteen minutes meaning that once the child is bored or uninterested with task at hand, they will resort to distracting themselves with something else. But how do you keep a child interested at any task much less reading? The answer is that reading must begin in classrooms. It is the society’s responsibility to revamp our educational system such that our classrooms reflect qualities we look for in order to simulate reading in classrooms. First, dedicated reading areas with books that would be of interest to students are the right way to begin. Second, the teacher must share in the responsibility of encouraging students to read by allocating time for reading activities and incentivizing those who read. Last but not least, this responsibility also extends to the community which can contribute by donating money or unused books lying in their basements. It is thereby possible to simulate reading in classroom if these simple steps are followed.
Schools can use the man...
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... materials; allocating time and grades; involving community in the effort to support monetarily or resource wise are effective measures that must be followed to simulate reading in classrooms. These steps help foster reading habits in students and nurture literacy. Simulating this desired habit of reading, creates good citizens in the future who give back to the community by further encouraging the habit of reading, the very habit that benefited them. This, in turn, creates a chance for this virtuous cycle to repeat, making a trend of reading. If we do this now, we can expect the future to be prosperous, technologically advanced and yet one defined by high moral standards slowly cultivated by regular reading in classrooms.
Works Cited
U.S Army. "Attention Deficit Disorder (Short Attention Span)." n.d. Evans Army Community Hospital. Document. 10 April 2014.
In the essay titled “How Teachers Make Children Hate Reading” written by John Holt and published in Reading for writers in 2013, Mr. Holt discusses why most children aren’t interested in reading. Mr. Holt spent fourteen years as an elementary school teacher. He believed classroom activities destroy a student’s learning ability. Mr. Holt never let his students say what they thought about a book. He wanted his students to look up every word they didn’t know. People can learn difficult words without looking them up in the dictionary.
On October 10th, 2017 at Springhurst Elementary School, I conducted a “Reading Interest Survey” and the “Elementary Reading Attitude Survey.” These surveys were conducted on a 1st grade student, Jax, to determine what his feelings are towards reading in different settings, what genres he prefers to read, and interests. It was found that Jax doesn’t mind reading, but prefers a few different topics. This was evident through his raw score of 30 on recreational reading, and a raw score of 31 on academic reading.
Reading is on the decline and our reading skills are declining right along with the amount of reading we do. This is happening right across the board through both genders, all age groups and education levels, people are busy and they just do not have time to read books that they are not required to read for school or work. There are serious consequences to this neglect of reading that will continue to worsen if ignored. We need to take notice of what is happening to our culture and stop this situation from continuing, we must act to correct these issues that we are faced with. These things are discussed in the essay “Staying Awake’’ by Ursula K. Le Guin who uses the NEA essays “To Read or Not to Read’’ and “Reading at Risk’’ to support her argument that there is a decline in the amount of time that we are spending on reading and our ability to understand what it is that we are reading.
...A Comprehensive Guide to Attention Deficit Disorder in Adults: Research,Diagnosis, and Treatment.New York: Brunner and Mazel Press, 1995.
Gomez, L. M., & Gomez, K. (2007). Reading for learning: Literacy supports for 21st-century work. Phi
Gale Encyclopedia of Neurological Disorders. 2005. The 'Secondary' of the 'Secondary' of the 'Second Encyclopedia.com. The World of War II. 17 May. 2012 http://www.encyclopedia.com Zieman, Gayle and Dewan, Naakeesh A. “Attention Deficit/ Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) in Adults”. Relay Clinical Education -.
...f Attention Deficit Disorder.” The New York Times. The New York Times Company. 14 Dec. 2013. Web. 5 March 2014.
Merrow, John. “Attention Deficit Disorder: A Dubious Diagnosis," The Merrow Report, New York, October, 1995.
Andrew Solomon has some valid arguments in his article, and he tries to persuade the readers through logos, pathos, and ethos. Solomon wants the readers to understand the importance of reading, and how its decline can be harmful to the nation. To reinforce his arguments, Solomon shares a variety of examples, for instance, he mentions that reading helps improve memory and concentration, and the decline of reading is causing mental “atrophy.” He also calls upon the readers to take some sort of action to raise reading rates and help the society. This can grant the readers a form of power and control over the crisis that will lead to an em...
National Institute of Mental Health (1999). Attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, Retrieved April 2, 2003 from www.nimh.nih.gov/publicat/adhd.cfm#adhd3
For my community involvement project, I volunteered at Memminger Elementary School for a program called “Reading Partners.” The program focuses on helping children build strong literacy skills to carry with them into their academic careers. It requires the tutor to read to the student that has been assigned and in turn the student reads to the tutor. The program assists in teaching the students valuable reading skills. Being able to read is critical to a child’s educational success. The program works with more than 100 schools within seven states. The program is geared toward students of low-income families. The statistics for children’s literacy in the United States are astonishing. “In 2011, just thirty-four percent of the nation’s fourth graders in public school could read proficiently” (National Center for Education Statistics, 2011). The program itself has had exponential success. Principals and teacher have reported that “Reading Partners” has helped increase students’ reading levels. During my time at the program I accumulated twelve volunteer hours.
Growing up in working class family, my mom worked all the time for the living of a big family with five kids, and my dad was in re-education camp because of his association with U.S. government before 1975. My grandma was my primary guardian. “Go to study, go to read your books, read anything you like to read if you want to have a better life,” my grandma kept bouncing that phrase in my childhood. It becomes the sole rule for me to have better future. I become curious and wonder what the inside of reading and write can make my life difference. In my old days, there was no computer, no laptop, no phone…etc, to play or to spend time with, other than books. I had no other choice than read, and read and tended to dig deep in science books, math books, and chemistry books. I tended to interest in how the problem was solved. I even used my saving money to buy my own math books to read more problems and how to solve the problem. I remembered that I ended up reading the same math book as my seventh grade teacher. She used to throw the challenge questions on every quiz to pick out the brighter student. There was few students know how to solve those challenge questions. I was the one who fortunately nailed it every single time. My passion and my logic for reading and writing came to me through that experience, and also through my grandma and my mom who plant the seed in me, who want their kids to have happy and better life than they were. In my own dictionary, literacy is not just the ability to read and write, it is a strong foundation to build up the knowledge to have better life, to become who I am today.
Journal of Attention Disorders. 17(2), 141-141. pp. 141-
While I believe every child is a reader, I do not believe every child will be enthralled with reading all the time. All students have the capability to read and enjoy reading, but just like any other hobby, interest will vary from student to student. The students in my classroom will be encouraged in their reading, be provided with choice, taught how books can take you into another world but, my students will not be forced to read. This paper will illustrate my philosophy of reading through the theories I relate to, the way I want to implement reading and writing curriculum, and the methods I will use motivate my students to read and help them become literate.