Don't blame all schools and don't blame all teachers. If you do want to know where to point the finger, I highly recommend reading the book Readicide by Kelly Gallagher. It's not so much what materials they're using, but how they're using them. It also has to do with putting so much extrinsic value on reading that the intrinsic rewards are devalued. (If you have to bribe/reward me to read, reading must suck.)
That said, I'm happy to say that in our school, reading is not associated with nerdiness or coolness (and there even is some overlap in the Venn diagram of nerdy and cool). I credit the lack of AR point goals and the push for pure student choice in independent reading. Sure, some girls are perplexed that they still have only found one or two books that they loved (working on that) and plenty of boys argue that "reading sucks" while trying to hide the fact that they're really saying that "reading is hard so it sucks" (working on that, too). But I smile every time students hope out loud for reading time in class.
Last edited by witeowl; 10-08-2011 at 01:41 PM.
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