If we’re to believe the conversations around higher education’s proverbial water cooler, our students are coming to us with poorly developed reading skills and are less prepared and willing to tackle college-level reading assignments than perhaps ever before. The Chronicle of Higher Education has published several pieces in this vein recently, including Beth McMurtrie’s “Is This the End of Reading?” and Beckie Supiano’s “Why Students Can’t Work on Their Own,” as well as a podcast titled “Is Reading over for Gen Z Students?” Evidence seems to suggest that our students struggle with reading comprehension, lack the analytical skills to think deeply and critically about what they read, and in general experience difficulty navigating challenging texts. As the articles mentioned above discuss, many professors have found themselves assigning less reading, providing more summary, and struggling to find ways to deliver content to students effectively. While there are many possible ways to encourage students to complete reading assignments, it may not be enough to simply reinforce the necessity of doing the reading. If we can no longer assume that reading is something our students can do without guidance, we should instead begin making literacy itself a centerpiece of our teaching. We should be asking our students to think about how they read just as much as what they read.
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