Posted on 02/11/2024 3:32:01 PM PST by algore
Recent years have seen successive waves of book bans in Republican-controlled states, aimed at pulling any text with “woke” themes from classrooms and library shelves.
But at the same time, the appropriate response is, in principle, simple... and we can replace those individuals with people who want to reverse those policies.
Defeating the open conspiracy to deprive students of physical access to books will do little to counteract the more diffuse confluence of forces that are depriving students of the skills needed to meaningfully engage with those books in the first place.
As a college educator, I am confronted daily with the results of that conspiracy-without-conspirators.
I have been teaching in small liberal arts colleges for over 15 years now, and in the past five years, it’s as though someone flipped a switch.
For most of my career, I assigned around 30 pages of reading per class meeting as a baseline expectation—sometimes scaling up for purely expository readings or pulling back for more difficult texts.
Now students are intimidated by anything over 10 pages and seem to walk away from readings of as little as 20 pages with no real understanding.
Even smart and motivated students struggle to do more with written texts than extract decontextualized take-aways.
Yes, professors never feel satisfied that high school teachers have done enough, but not every generation of professors has had to deal with the fallout of No Child Left Behind and Common Core.
Finally, yes, every generation thinks the younger generation is failing to make the grade—except for the current cohort of professors, who are by and large more invested in their students’ success and mental health.
We are not complaining about our students. We are complaining about what has been taken from them.
(Excerpt) Read more at slate.com ...
Why can't Shaqu'ra or Johnny read?
Woke libtard professor complaining about the low abilities of kids that HE is responsible for as he taught over 15 years the dumb downed curriculum that made these kids so slow.
Chickens... Roost.
They don’t have good teachers, and too much time is spent on relative crap.
There’s probably an inattentive parent component, too.
Communism is easier with illiterates.
Check out The Shallows by Nicholas Carr.
The internet has ruined thought.
“the current cohort of professors, who are by and large more invested in their students’ success and MENTAL HEALTH.” -emphasis mine
Translated: mental health = gender identity/DEI/etc.
Um, that’s the problem. It’s not the job of the teacher to be concerned about the mental health of students. Teachers are to provide reading/writing/math instruction in a safe environment. The problem with students these days is that the teachers spend time on everything but that!
The students cheat like crazy and they get decent grades, as a result.
Why ever learn to enjoy reading when one’s next swipe on the phone gets them a new sex partner each evening?
Republican states have not banned any books. They simply choose not to buy books that are written to sexualize children for grade school libraries. This “educator” should look to his colleges in elementary and secondary schools nationwide for the cause of why “Johnny can’t read”. Education is dead in America.
I understood what he is saying as I have a college degree. And can understand high brow educrat speech. I pity the young skulls full of mush who take his class. Unable, thanks to teachers like him who taught teachers these kids had for 12 years, who can't read and can't understand the whiny ramblings of this moron professor.
I am 60 years old and I read every letter of War and Peace. It is sad.
What has been taken from them has been a quality education, replaced with a woke agenda that primarily sexualizes children.
Now who could be responsible for that if not for liberal educators?
” I pity the young skulls full of mush who take his class. Unable, thanks to teachers like him who taught teachers these kids had for 12 years, who can’t read and can’t understand the whiny ramblings of this moron professor.”
I am glad they cannot understand.
The “students” can’t read but they sure know how to engage in sodomy, since that’s what they teach in pubic schools now-a-days (if not for those waves of book bans). /spit
“Book bans”
Lol.
There is more available to read now than any time in human history.
The left does ban a few books—but there are plenty more out there.
“Book bans”
Lol.
There is more available to read now than any time in human history.
The left does ban a few books—but there are plenty more out there.
When I was learning to read, my dad taught me something that helped me throughout my life. He would have me read a page or paragraph and then he would take away the book and say “now tell me what you read”. I would start to repeat something and he would say “no, don’t tell me the words you memorized, tell me what it said”.
That tiny little lesson stayed with me the rest of my life. It taught me to love reading, how to analyze, how to understand. They don’t teach like that anymore.
1. Author is anti-conservative who cannot comprehend that restricting inappropriate books from children has no impact on lack of student comprehension. They are not removing Stunk & White's Elements of Style in libraries.
2. Author is a terrible writer. Not surprise student performance has declined during his 15 years at the college.
3. His conclusion is not clear. Why are children not reading? He bounces around a bunch of things like social media, conservatives, common core curriculum, standardized tests, the C19 pandemic, lack of phonics in education, etc. but lacks logic and structure in driving to conclusion.
freedom of speech for me but not thee....
I can ban books and thoughts, but you can't...
The combination of mal education and eyes glued to phones has been deadly to the thinking capacity of the young, and it is exactly what the Satanic left intended. We are currently paying just the interest on that policy, but the full bill will soon be due and it will be catastrophic.
Yes and no.
Sometimes the Streisand effect is real, both the right and left ban books.
Today there are gatekeepers, and books are digital.
One used to only sell paper books, today they want to control and edit them.
Probably why they want to ‘kindle’ paper
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