How tweens and teens consume the written word is quickly evolving. They used to routinely devour long-form reading—chapter books, mysteries, young adult series. Now, that may be the rarity rather than the norm.
Instead, much of this demographic’s pleasure reading tends to consist of a combination of receiving and sending quick snippets of text, like DM’s and Snaps, while simultaneously scrolling through social media and videos laden with short text blurbs.
What happens when students move quickly across the written word, ping-ponging between multiple threads of surface content? And how does that compare to the act of immersing oneself in a long-form text that reveals a dynamic setting, complex characters, and an evolving plot—sometimes over hundreds of pages?
We asked experts in literacy, cognition, and child development to weigh in. Here’s what they shared.
What happens when we give the brain more time?
Maryanne Wolf, a renowned cognitive neuroscientist, literacy scholar, and director of the Center for Dyslexia, Diverse Learners, and Social Justice at the University of California Los Angeles, thinks a lot about the process of reading.
“Everything [in reading] is about how the circuit for the reading brain is used or not used,” Wolf said. Long form reading requires our brain’s time, attention, and effort, she explains. Reading long-form fiction, she says, takes us down an even deeper path.
“Reading fiction inspires us to leave our own perspective behind, and take on the thoughts and feelings of others,” Wolf said. “You are enriching your capacity for empathy, and your capacity to take on the experience, the life, the epoch, the culture of others.”
The same can’t be said for reading snippets of text, Wolf observes, whether it’s a brief reading passage on a standardized reading assessment or the captions on a short-from video.
“They’re just getting at the surface of the word, rather than the subterranean life that gives meaning and beauty, and further thought,” Wolf said.
Long- and short-form reading both require executive functioning skills: working memory, cognitive flexibility, (response) inhibition, and to a lesser degree, attention and processing speed, says Baltimore-based psychologist Danielle Wexler. But short-form reading places less demand overall on the reader, she adds.
“The demands for those executive functioning skills when you’re reading a longer text are substantially higher than if you’re reading a short text or quick message,” said Wexler, who works with patients and conducts research at the Center for Neuropsychological and Psychological Assessment at Kennedy Krieger, a world-renowned institute for treating pediatric disabilities.
The demands for ... executive functioning skills when you're reading a longer text are substantially higher than if you're reading a short text or quick message.
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If long-form reading conveys benefits, does short-form reading carry other, different ones?
“I think in some ways short-form reading helps teens learn how to shift between tasks more easily,” Wexler said. “But then the question then becomes: Can they apply that to something that’s less preferred; for example, their homework?”
Effective multi-tasking is particularly challenging for kids with attention issues, like attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, Wexler observes. “If you’re a child with ADHD, sometimes multitasking goes terribly wrong,” she said. “You might have 20 different tabs open on your computer, but you never finish any of the related tasks.”
Wolf concedes that interacting with the constant stream of pithy verbal messages bombarding adolescents on social media may help them learn how to manage large quantities of information. But she offers this caveat: “As long as you use it as a sieve to find what you really want to, that’s a skill. But if you just use it as your basic modus operandi, it’s a detriment.
“It’s just getting at the surface of the world, rather than the subterranean life that gives meaning and beauty, and further thought,” Wolf said.
You have the ability that a lot of people did not have previously, which is how to handle massive amounts of information. Your skill mode is actually quite useful when you have that kind of information—as long as you use it as a sieve to find what you really want to.
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For educators, the relevant question might be: Long-form reading is challenging, and something students are much less likely to do on their own. So what can schools do to require rich texts, support students through them, and encourage them to read on their own?
EdWeek’s latest special report, on engagement and motivation in reading, has some ideas—both inside and outside of classrooms.
Wolf, for her part, calls on teachers to protect it.
Teachers, Wolf says, should continue to set expectations high for students; for example, assigning whole texts as opposed to summaries for proficient readers.
“God forbid that George Eliot is never read by the next generation,” Wolf said. “But it’s possible.”
We either create or we are recipients.
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Laura Baker is the Deputy Managing Editor, Creative, for Education Week focused on developing visual and immersive storytelling across platforms.