Talk:Reading

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[edit] Length of text

Is there an optimal length of text for the ease the a person reading? For instance, why in some articles, essays, newspapers, they write in columns? Does this help reading and/or comprehension? 70.111.251.203 00:51, 26 February 2006 (UTC)

I would say that when the text is broken up into columns it is sometimes easier to follow graphically - so that when you finish one line of text it is quicker and simpler to find the beginning of the next one. That way you lose less time and do not have to concentrate much on looking for the place where the text is continuing, but can keep your mind on the contents of the text you're reading. --Ouro 10:58, 14 May 2006 (UTC)
That's correct. I've seen 66 characters per line recommended as maximum. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 89.240.130.234 (talk) 22:07, 11 May 2007 (UTC).

[edit] Obesity

Shouldn't there be a drawbacks of reading section. Ie, you are sittting when you are reading, sitting is a part of a sedentary lifestyle, sedenatry lifestyles lead to obesity. Therefore, reading leads to obesity. Richardkselby 01:46, 25 June 2006 (UTC)

I don't know of any evidence that there's a link. The flaw in your logic is this: sitting is part of both a sedentary and active lifestyle. Everyone sits. --Drmarc 21:50, 4 August 2006 (UTC)


This may very well be the most meaningless entry I've ever encoutered. As increasing numbers of individuals work to enhance the general public's readings skills, I'm a bit shaken to see how trivially the matter is being treated.—Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.224.193.26 (talk • contribs)

Fine, I'll be fat and smart, you be thin, but thick as a brick.—Preceding unsigned comment added by 64.53.143.8 (talk • contribs)

[edit] Benefits?

It seems to me that tbe "benefits" of reading listed in the article are not benefits at all, but obvious consequences of belonging to a socio-economic group in which reading is likely, promoted, and socially accepted. For instance, "studies have shown that American children who learn to read by the third grade are less likely to end up in prison, drop out of school, or take drugs." Here's to betting those children also have parents with higher incomes and educations, attend better funded schools, etc. Similarly, "adults who read literature on a regular basis are nearly three times as likely to attend a performing arts event, almost four times as likely to visit an art museum, more than two-and-a-half times as likely to do volunteer or charity work, and over one-and-a-half times as likely to participate in sporting activities". It's not by virtue of reading that these "benefits" are conferred, but that the same kinds of people who read regularly also visit art museums regularly -- the relationship isn't causal, so in the very least, the title of this section shouldn't be called "Benefits".

My teacher and the students were having a discussion about reading. The title is "A day without reading, is a day wasted." My teacher eventually hit us with a question and said "If you read something and don't understand, would you consider that as reading?" That was a good question!! If u all have any objection please do so and discuss.

Amos P

[edit] Societal Views on Reading?

What about how different cultures view reading? A lot of people associate reading with scholarly inquisitions, and then there is also the extreme - those who only read (bookworms?). And shouldn't illiteracy be at least mentioned? Are these topics significant enough? Maybe put them under Misc for now.

[edit] Hodge Podge

This article seems to be a mishmash of information, indicated by the fact that "Reading speed" is the second topic and "Miscellaneous" has a large place. I think it makes sense to reorganize the information according to the domains of literacy: phonological awareness, phonics, fluency, vocabulary, and reading comprehension (the latter should probably be subdivided, perhaps into comprehension processes [e.g., working memory] and knowledge). If there is no objection, I'll do that sometime in the next week. Kearnsdm 08:21, 14 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Reading in a computer

is there any good info about how to best read in a computer? font type, size, etc. ? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 201.83.178.101 (talk) 05:30, 7 April 2007 (UTC).


[edit] Biased Section

The entire section headed "Skill Development" seems to be an argument for altering the standard spelling of English words to a phonetic system. It is an opinionated rant. Why is this under "Skill Devlopment"? The claim that the problem is the language itself rather than inadequate education is utterly unsubstantiated in the article. The author of this section evidently learned to read - so did I, and we managed to do it despite the bizarre and inconsistent quirks of English spelling.

Has the author looked at the Wikipedia entry for the list of countries by literacy rate? The Reading entry also seems to claim that "Chinese picture-writing symbols" are easier to learn to read than English words. The literacy rate in China is lower than that of most English-speaking countries, and looking at the list by literacy rate, I see no correlation between writing system and literacy rates. Clearly, the type of writing system is not the main predictor of literacy. I propose that the argument for changing the spelling of English be deleted, or at the very least moved to an appropriate section.

I agree and was struck by the apparent bias of that section, so I have added a POV marker to that section. Various statements such as "The Only Way Students Learn to Read English As a result, the ONLY way students can learn to read English is to learn the spelling of all 20,000 or more words in their reading vocabulary one-at-a-time by rote memory or by repeated use of the word. This learning can come through either the phonics or partially through the whole word teaching method." seem questionable to me and are unsourced. I don't think these sentiments have either scientific support or are in accord with the views of most educators. Armarshall 14:01, 23 May 2007 (UTC)
I would go a step further. This isn't just a "biased section"; it's vandalism, plain and simple. There is absolutely no way that this extraordinary rant can be integrated into the rest of the article; this is self-evident, and doesn't require any extensive soul-searching on our part to determine. As of ten seconds from now, I am removing the offending content. Mattrognlie 07:30, 25 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] The section on speed reading could stand to be explained

"Speed reading courses and books often encourage the reader to continually speed up; comprehension tests lead the reader to believe their comprehension is constantly improving. However, competence in reading involves the understanding that skimming is dangerous as a default habit."

Speed reading information I've seen stresses comprehension, with that in mind I do not understand how speed reading could be considered dangerous as a default habit. It'd be a good idea to explain this fully or remove it 70.132.22.157 02:04, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Subvocalized reading

The page for subvocalization and this one contradict. I subvocalize when I read and I have had the reading level of a 12 grader since I was in 7th grade. Others I know also subvocalize and they excel in reading just as much as I do. I'm sorry but that information is heavily biased and promotes speed reading.

[edit] Correlation vs. causality

The section "Effect of Reading" begins with the statement: "Studies have shown that American children who learn to read by the third grade are less likely to end up in prison, drop out of school, or take drugs. Adults who read literature on a regular basis are nearly three times as likely to attend a performing arts event, almost four times as likely to visit an art museum, more than two-and-a-half times as likely to do volunteer or charity work, and over one-and-a-half times as likely to participate in sporting activities, according to Jamie Littlefield on charityguide.org.[2]"

But a glance at the Littlefield article cited indicates that no "effects" have been shown at all. Rather, it appears to claim nothing more than correlation between reading and the positive effects cited.

And this interpretation is further quite plausible: Educated, more intelligent families tend to have children who avoid behaviors that result in prison time, etc., and who are more cultured, etc.

It's not implausible, either, that reading might very well *cause* the effects noted. But that is not what the cited article claims. It just claims that children who read are more likely to have the cited qualities: this is the same as claiming *correlation* -- something far easier to infer from data than is *causation*.

Thus, the word effects is not appropriate here, since this word means causal relationships, not mere correlation. Daqu 18:14, 28 July 2007 (UTC)


Perhaps another way to approach this would be to say that the correlation is firmly established, but that at least some researchers and statisticians suspect a causative relationship between reading failure and increased rates of poverty, need of public assistance, high birth rate, death (due partly to illiteracy impeding good health care -- e.g., decreased ability to take medications as directed due to illiteracy, etc) imprisonment, recidivism, and so on.
There is a further clear relationship between reading failure frequently being the result of learning disabilities, which cuts across socioeconomic lines. History of difficulty in school -- failure to learn, and especially failure to learn to read, results in shame and poor self image, rejection from peers, increased behavior issues, increased juvenile delinquency, juvenile incarceration, etc etc.
My point is, there is clearly a case to be made for causation, and the research /statistics supporting this line of thought should be included in the article with notation that this is not proven but suspected, at least by some.
Obviously, appropriate citations would need to be provided. I'll look for some.
Best,
Rosmoran 17:29, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Great images; idea about navigation box for reading and related topics

Hi,

Whoever added the new graphic images, good choices! They look terrific.

Also, I've seen some sets of related articles that use nice info boxes that point users directly to closely related topics, in context of the main article rather than at the bottom. I put together a strawman to illustrate the idea and would like for interested editors to take a look and see what you think.

Here is a strawman to give you an idea of what I'm proposing:

User:Rosmoran/sandbox/reading/reading template

Here is a mock up of what the reading article might look like with this navigation template added:

User:Rosmoran/sandbox/reading/example reading article with nav template

Thoughts?

Best,

Rosmoran 19:27, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

[edit] History section

I removed the "history of reading" section, which was written in an unencyclopedic tone and appeared to contain original research. If someone feels like restoring the section, can you please rewrite it in a more encyclopedic tone and cite reliable sources... - ∅ (∅), 04:24, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Does Reading Make You Sleep?

If I've had a time in my life when I've been reading regularly revising for exams etc. I've found that I tend to sleep a lot more and dream vivid dreams. Have there ever been any studies on this kind of thing? I know that if I read for an hour a day it really helps me sleep. Ben 2082 (talk) 18:28, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Content of article

The content of this article seems very random. The topics don't seem to relate to one another, and sections seem to be unmatched in the level of detail they present.

Look at the major topics covered:

  • reading rates
  • types of reading (proofreading, close reading, etc)
  • skill development (but only discusses initial reading acquisition -- doesn't address acquiring skills related to the types discussed in Types of Reading)
  • reading assessment -- related specifically to assessing progress during initial reading acquisition.
  • effects of reading (social effects, such as higher literacy rates results in lower prison populations)
  • lighting

The relationship among most of these topics is at best scanty.

I'm thinking we need to revisit the content of the entire article, and consider covering the topic at a very high level with sub-articles providing the details.

Thoughts? Other ideas?

Rosmoran (talk) 00:27, 28 February 2008 (UTC)

I second your proposition; this article seems very confusing and needs revision - there's simply too much information compressed into too little of a space. I can start by rearranging the sections and cleaning up the text, but that will be a while - in the time in between some comments would be nice.
Here is a possible outline:
  1. History
  2. Reading skills; sub-section: Development, Assement, Methods
  3. Effects
  4. Health; sub-section: Vising, Lighting
  5. Notes
  6. References
  7. External links
  8. See also
ChyranandChloe (talk) 03:38, 2 May 2008 (UTC)
The first step revision has taken place, all sections have been revised to a more logical order. Furthermore most images of people reading has been commented out; they are interesting and appealing, but they are also unnecessary for the relevance of this article. They however would be perfect for a history section and posses potential for a new article. Next step is improving the wording and consistency of this article, in addition to adding a "History" section. ChyranandChloe (talk) 03:26, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Eye damage

Anything on how far something you're reading should be away from you? or if it is damaging to your eyes to read in the dark? I hear that reading in the dark actually doesn't damage or strain your eyes; and reading something in front of you should be around a foot away. Any research/information? 70.111.251.203 00:48, 26 February 2006 (UTC)

Yes, I've heard of eye damage, myopia, eye strain, and so on before. So far the information I'm heard is - well - it's controversial. For instance, public perception has it that myopia is caused by reading - especially reading in the dark where there is eye strain; however, from a physician I spoke to that's untrue, myopia is "genetics". There has been research conducted that reading or more specifically intelligence is linked to myopia, and they are hypothesizing that reading is the genetic trigger to myopia; for example, just has your muscles adapt when they are used, you eyes will reshape and thus refocus to the distance you view things at the most. Anyway, here are some links Myopia, Ohio State, More links with Google.ChyranandChloe (talk) 03:51, 6 May 2008 (UTC)