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The Guardian - US
The Guardian - US
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Margaret Sullivan

Many schools don’t think students can read full novels any more. That’s a tragedy

child reading in a primary school classroom
‘Many teens read far fewer full novels than in the past.’ Photograph: Justin Leighton/Alamy

Reading fiction has been such a joy for me that my heart broke a little to learn recently that many schools no longer assign full books to high school students.

Rather, teens are given excerpts of books, and they often read them not in print but on school-issued laptops, according to a survey of 2,000 teachers, students and parents by the New York Times.

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