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Serious Reading Takes a Hit from Online Scanning and Skimming – an article
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This article is interesting and sad, but very true.
I have seen this in myself and have made a point to unplug even more often.
Christie
“Word lovers and scientists have called for a “slow reading” movement”
Hmmm…seems I’ve heard that somewhere before… Oh yeah, Charlotte Mason.
Highly recommended everyone read The Shallows: What the Internet Is Doing to Our Brains by Nicholas Carr. This book was the main reason I started my blog. I wanted to bring attention to the importance of this so I wrote a series of articles about this book.
http://www.childrenslegacylibrary.blogspot.com
Warning, I’m not a great writer. Just a concerned one. The first of The Shallows posts should be under Sept., 2012. I think it’s called The Future of Reading. The book is better. 🙂
I must admit that while reading this article my eyes kept wanting to skim. Clearly I need to work on my slow reading skills. I have stopped getting ebooks, because I have already noticed that my focus and comprehension is better with paper. Very interesting and important topic. Thanks.
I have to admit that I skimmed the article.
But could the content be responsible and not just a trend of skimming? I’m not so convinced we tend to skim if content is written in a living way. I tend to agree with Doug. I would take it a little further, though, and say that I tend to skim those things that I do not necessarily consider life-changing or life-enriching. For example, I often skim general news articles, Pinterest boards, some threads on this forum…..but I have been reading Jane Austen’s novel, Emma, for over a month now. Why so long? Because I intend to savor the book, and my only time to read it is often at bedtime, whereupon I fall asleep within 10 minutes.
Back in pre-internet days we called it speed reading.
And just as we now have web pages with ads all around trying to distract our attention, newspapers and magazines had the same thing. The big difference might be that the internet tends to favor short articles so our reading time can be taken up by those instead of books or other long-form works.Actually, I agree whole heartedly with the article. I find if I spend an extended period of time (a couple of months) reading mainly online or just articles, it is quite a challenge to buckle down and read slowly again. I will have to reread pages or even chapters. Once I get back to reading more real books, it improves, but I do think a habit of skimming is detrimental.
I sort of agree with Doug. I have always “sped read” — always. Even now, I have trouble remembering and telling what I’ve read because of speed reading. I have to seriously concentrate in order to not speed read. So, in my case – it’s not caused by online reading. I think what caused it for me was a desire (as a youngster) to find out what happened in the book I was reading. I was (am) a voracious reader, reading everything I could get my hands on. I find that certain authors (Blackstock, Henderson, etc. – the twaddle authors) exacerbate my speed reading problem. And it almost seems like an addiction! It’s sort of weird. I actually don’t read those types of books often anymore, because I’m trying to break myself of the speed-reading habit.
And really, even when I take my time through a book, I often can’t explain it as well as I wish to. In order to narrate something adequately (what’s adequate in my mind), I have to read a section of a book twice or more.
One thing I’ve learned to do is to speed read through the book and satisfy my curiosity and then go back and start again and try my best to remember what I’m reading, and to read mindfully. (Although that’s sort of like eating the bag of m&m’s so they don’t tempt me anymore! *L*) I catch myself reading words and not even thinking about what I’m reading. I can even read aloud and decide what’s for dinner or think other mom-type thoughts at the same time!!! But I have no idea what I’ve read out loud! And then I ask the kids to narrate!!!
Talk about bad habits!!! *L*
This circulated around the homeschooling community here too. Very interesting! It certainly makes you aware of how you are reading. I thought the point about “not going back” in terms of how much techonology is in our lives is poignant. There is no future without it. So how will we adapt? It’s facinating that the brain isn’t naturally wired to read as it is for other activities – speech for example. I was astonished to realized we had learned to read. I know that sounds silly, but I guess I’d never thought about it before reading this article.
But could the content be responsible and not just a trend of skimming? I’m not so convinced we tend to skim if content is written in a living way. 
And just as we now have web pages with ads all around trying to distract our attention, newspapers and magazines had the same thing. The big difference might be that the internet tends to favor short articles so our reading time can be taken up by those instead of books or other long-form works.
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