Teachers need to gradually push students. Not all reading is "reading" any more than all thinking is "thinking." Being part of the internet generation doesn't mean students should get a free pass. Surely they will be happy to have less demanding work. That doesn't mean it's good for them in the long run. My oldest is 16 and in 10th grade honors english/history. It's a program called IGCSE, that comes out of Oxford. They have to meet the state SOL standards and they have to pass this test from the UK system. It's a two year program that started in 9th grade and combines English and History together (a very good match, I think). She complained vociferously in the beginning about all the reading and about how hard it all was. It was a terrible experience. She was so accustomed to coasting and learning almost nothing. Finally she had a teacher who pushed her. She hated it - absolutely loathed it - but eventually came to appreciate it.
I recall coming to her on a weekend once. I walked into her room with a cup of tea and maybe some cookies (I don't recall). I sat it down and she never looked up. She started complaining (still without looking up) and it was something like "Daddy, you just wouldn't *BELIEVE* how much homework I have!" and then she looks up at me very briefly and very seriously, "GOD, I LOVE THAT WOMAN!" and then turns back to her work. I left.
The injustice that kids are getting these days isn't just that they aren't learning all that they could learn, but that they are not learning to push themselves. They're not learning to stretch their limits. That's obviously not true of every kid in every class, but I think it's true in the cases where it's true. The biggest problem my daughter has was having an 8th grade English teacher who didn't push her - to prepare her.
