Is Skimming Replacing Reading? Why, Yes.

We are reading less deeply for briefer amounts of time and with less investment than we used to. At least that’s what Maryanne Wolf, author of Proust and the Squid, argues in this opinion piece. She worries, in part, that:

The possibility that critical analysis, empathy and other deep reading processes could become the unintended “collateral damage” of our digital culture is not a simple binary issue about print vs digital reading. It is about how we all have begun to read on any medium and how that changes not only what we read, but also the purposes for why we read.

I underscore her point. It can be easy to focus too intensely on things like what we read and certainly how. But we must not lose sight of why we read, and make sure to attend to things that motivate our students’ reading as earnestly as the content and device.