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University Students Are Unable to Read a Whole Book
Breitbart ^ | 17 April 2016 | Donna Rachel Edmunds

Posted on 04/18/2016 3:18:12 PM PDT by daisy12

University students are increasingly unable to read a whole book as they simply don’t have the concentration spans required, nor are they able to understand complex, nuanced arguments, academics have said.

Lecturers at leading British universities are having to actively encourage students to read beyond the set texts, and have noticed that students are increasingly unwilling to read whole texts. They say they believe internet culture is to blame, as young people nowadays are used to receiving arguments in the form of 800-1000 word articles. Anything beyond that, they say, is now proving too challenging.

“Incoming undergraduates have had their attention habits fashioned in a totally different world than that of those who are teaching them,” Tamson Pietsch, fellow in history at the University of Sydney told Times Higher Education (THE).

“This can lead to a clash of expectations and also of abilities on both sides of the equation. In many ways, incoming students absorb information quickly, they understand the power of images, and are adept at moving between different types of sources and platforms. They are perhaps less used to concentrating for long periods of time and working through the nuances of an argument developed over the course of many pages.”

Jenny Pickerill, professor in environmental geography at the University of Sheffield, said of full length books: “students struggle with them, saying the language or concepts are too hard.

(Excerpt) Read more at breitbart.com ...


TOPICS: Culture/Society; News/Current Events; United Kingdom
KEYWORDS: bookreading; concentration; education; highereducation; literacy; literature; trends
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1 posted on 04/18/2016 3:18:12 PM PDT by daisy12
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To: daisy12

The world needs ditch diggers, too.


2 posted on 04/18/2016 3:19:14 PM PDT by dfwgator
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To: daisy12

I KNOW freeper women were reading Laura Ingalls Wilder books, Nancy Drew, Little Women, etc like I was back in elementary school.

Guess those days are gone.


3 posted on 04/18/2016 3:20:36 PM PDT by daisy12
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To: daisy12

No surprise when admission standards are “Do you have a checkbook or know someone who does?” Students have turned into business clients, hence the need to admit, then keep them around and enrolled for 4-7 years.


4 posted on 04/18/2016 3:21:54 PM PDT by choctaw man (Good ole Andrew Jackson, or You're the Reason God Made Oklahoma...)
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To: daisy12

What if its written with chalk?


5 posted on 04/18/2016 3:22:19 PM PDT by Raycpa
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To: daisy12

I never had a problem with reading a college book. What I had a problem with was that every term, I was ‘required’ to purchase the newest edition of a textbook, often at ridiculously high prices (sometimes several hundred dollars each) and then the professor either using less then 50% or none of the book at all during class.


6 posted on 04/18/2016 3:22:46 PM PDT by LoneStarGI (Vegetarian: Old Indian word for "BAD HUNTER.")
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To: daisy12

Kind of explains odumbo, doesn’t it?


7 posted on 04/18/2016 3:23:23 PM PDT by LoneStar42
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To: Raycpa
What if its written with chalk?

....or cursive?

8 posted on 04/18/2016 3:24:10 PM PDT by GreenHornet
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To: daisy12

They had no idea, of how to turn it on.


9 posted on 04/18/2016 3:24:49 PM PDT by SandRat (Duty - Honor - Country! What else needs said?)
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To: daisy12

I was reading Tolkien in elementary school


10 posted on 04/18/2016 3:25:26 PM PDT by thoughtomator
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To: daisy12

Los ANgeles Unified School District publicly admits that 76% of HIGH SCHOOL GRADUATES can not read or write above a 3rd grade level, math is 2nd grade.


11 posted on 04/18/2016 3:25:40 PM PDT by eyeamok
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To: daisy12
Jenny Pickerill, professor in environmental geography

Having these pc departments and pc majors are part of the problem.

12 posted on 04/18/2016 3:25:58 PM PDT by libertylover (The problem with Obama is not that his skin is too black, it's that his ideas are too RED.)
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To: daisy12
FEEBLE IN THE MIND

ALWAYS LAG BEHIND.

13 posted on 04/18/2016 3:26:13 PM PDT by MarvinStinson
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To: daisy12
They say they believe internet culture is to blame, as young people nowadays are used to receiving arguments in the form of 800-1000 word articles. Anything beyond that, they say, is now proving too challenging.

Bullshiite

Todays young people can't deal with 140 characters. Their attention span is STRETCHED at Yahoo or Youtube.

The very reason Obama and other Dems speak in short...bite...sized...sentences.

Sound bites.

Anything beyond a sound bite and they are confused.

14 posted on 04/18/2016 3:26:14 PM PDT by mountn man (The Pleasure You Get From Life, Is Equal To The Attitude You Put Into It)
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To: daisy12

University students are increasingly unable to read a whole book as they simply don’t have the concentration spans required, nor are they able to understand complex, nuanced arguments, academics have said.

__________________________________________

I wonder how many University student would read this paragraph and get stalled at the word ‘nuanced’.

“New-antsd”? umm... “Nwaunced”??


15 posted on 04/18/2016 3:27:23 PM PDT by Responsibility2nd (Plan A. Split the GOP. Plan B. Hillary Wins!)
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To: daisy12

Anyone who cannot do calculus and also cannot read “a whole book” has no business in college. The degree earned by that person will not support any useful contribution to society. College is not for everybody.


16 posted on 04/18/2016 3:27:25 PM PDT by Pollster1 (Somebody who agrees with me 80% of the time is a friend and ally, not a 20% traitor. - Ronald Reagan)
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To: daisy12

Tom Jones for the Oxford and Cambridge types.


17 posted on 04/18/2016 3:28:11 PM PDT by Red Steel
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To: daisy12

They need to update books for modern times, like C.S. Lewis’s classic The Screwtape Blog.


18 posted on 04/18/2016 3:28:55 PM PDT by KarlInOhio (An orange jumpsuit is the new black pantsuit.)
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To: thoughtomator
I was reading Tolkien in elementary school

I was writing Tolkien in elementary school.


19 posted on 04/18/2016 3:29:18 PM PDT by mountn man (The Pleasure You Get From Life, Is Equal To The Attitude You Put Into It)
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To: mountn man

I wasn’t kidding. I had completed the entire Lord of the Rings series including The Hobbit in 3rd grade.


20 posted on 04/18/2016 3:30:47 PM PDT by thoughtomator
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