“I can understand. Reading is hard.”
I know you’re being sarcastic, but READING IS EASY.
It only gets hard when we experiment and try to re-invent how to teach it. If the kid is between 3 and 6 years old, it takes about 2 months of intensive instruction.
But I know that’s too much for most parents, who are more concerned with their own careers, or making sure their twerp has the latest X-Box, etc.
...so I guess you’re right, READING IS HARD (at least to most American parents).
I’m not being sarcastic. I meant relative to other things kids do, like sex or heroin. And it can be very hard depending on what you’re reading. I can fly through Plato or Shakespeare, for instance, though probably nit getting all that I could. But sit me in front of a hard science book and I might take a year.
Which speaks to learning as culture in the old sense. As with agriculture, you have to tend to something to name it grow. Some books are meant for mass consumption, others you have to work your way up to. It is the work that kids fear, especially when so many get away with it and there are far easier things to do.