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More than half of UK children do not read in their spare time, survey reveals
(www.theguardian.com)
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this post was submitted on 04 Sep 2023
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It's not surprising. Reading for pleasure was phased out of schools a long time ago and replaced by "Literacy" and Accelerated Reader where kids are tested on the books they read and have to finish them as fast as they can.
We have a neo-liberal school curriculum in the UK that only sees reading as a function of employment or cultural indoctrination (in the case of the statutory requirement to teach Shakespeare and that no non-UK writers are allowed to be studied at GCSE).
Not sure about that last bit, Of Mice and Men is a pretty standard GCSE text and it's written by an American
Here’s a a report fron 2014 about it:
https://amp.theguardian.com/education/2014/may/25/mockingbird-mice-and-men-axed-michael-gove-gcse
As an ex-English teacher I can assure you that’s the case. It changed in the 2016 reforms (when, among other things grades turned into numbers). It’s the same for To Kill a Mockingbird, another much-taught US text.
Some schools use Of Mice and Men as class readers in Year 8 and 9.
Well that's daft, they're both perfectly good books. I finished my gcse's in 2016 so must've narrowly missed it
Here’s a a report fron 2014 about it:
https://amp.theguardian.com/education/2014/may/25/mockingbird-mice-and-men-axed-michael-gove-gcse
In elementary school we weren't even allowed to check out books from the library if the teacher didn't think we could pass the AR test because it would lower the class average.
I’ve witnessed children forced to read three or four thin “books” in an Accelerated Reader lesson so they can be tested 3-4 times to improve their “data” / test results.
I’m HIGHLY sceptical about the quality of the data the tests produce (reading ages and some sort of AR “progress”).
The whole idea of ACCELERATING reading of books is just repulsive and wrong. Some children (and adults) get more out of a book by simply reading at their own pace and enjoying it.