I had never heard of "Once a Runner", but I might look into it. Looking at the summary, it reminds me a bit of the real life story of Louie Zamperini. He may have become the first to run a sub 4:00 mile if Japan hadn't attacked Pearl Harbor. How many other future great athletes were lost in the carnage? We'll never know, but the aftermath is the landscape Roger Bannister emerged in. Truly compelling stories worth reading about.
Mark, get yourself a copy of Once A Runner. Then, move on to Parker's other two books, Racing the Rain and Again to Carthage: A Novel. Get them all in hardcover and pass them along to a new generation. John knows how to write running stories.
"The illusion of knowing" applies to so much today. Thank you for writing this and making all these connections. I see what you're saying and really appreciate the action steps.
Steve, Brilliant! This should be required reading for legislatures and school boards; the stats drive the point home. We collectively need to address this before we completely lose reading. Your remedies are on point, however, #3 should be #1. It all starts with parents and the home. This is the foundational piece that must be stressed; reading practises and examples at home set kids up for a life of reading. Reading to kids every night at bed and having a family read time, rather than movie night, will make reading an activity that they will enjoy and incorporate into their lives. What families do together will be repeated and passed down. We need to stop pointing the finger at phones and have a look in the mirror to see who is responsible for positive change.
Yep. The remedies are in no particular order, and I'm sure there's more we can do. But of course it starts at home! Which is part of the problem... Parents aren't reading either! So it doesn't get modeled or valued.
Hi Steve. This is great and truly important. I think it's especially important to come from someone who doesn't obviously have a personal/financial stake in these things. We all need to be saying that kids/people should be reading more.
One thing that I will add here to your section on environment is that it's not just the home we should be worried about. Schools have become digital wastelands with less well resourced libraries and fewer books that no one ever touches. Even schools that have "banned" phones still often happily hand out ipads and chromebooks with free access to the internet day and night. Kids are required to use internet based learning management tools to get assignments and interact with their teachers. It seems that we expect kids to be superhumans who will responsibly post an assignment and then turn off their computer to read a book. It's just dumb. Of course they're going to scroll. As a parent of teenagers who love to read books I have witnessed the constant struggle for them to find space for themselves to not be forced onto a screen or to get their friends out of theirs for a while. We've opted out of ipads at school. Just said no, and they remain a great students who actually talk to teachers. It doesn't have to be this way.
Every school should build time into the school day for kids to read books of their own choosing. The library should be the central hub of every school at every grade level.
You become better at something by doing it and often. Then why not do that with reading during the school day. Let kids read.
I am becoming a "paid" subscriber today! I am a recently retired English teacher and longtime XC and track and field coach and talking books with my student/athletes was always a favorite pastime. Loved your "Once a Runner" reference as I have recommended and even gifted many of my runners over the years - especially the boys - this book. I had retired from coaching after 40 consecutive seasons and then after three years "off" agreed to help a new team for me with being an assistant cross country and high jump coach in the spring. I run/plod with the girls (I am helping an all-girls high school team in Sacramento) and the other day on day # 6 of running day camp where the topmost fit runners ran twice around Donner Lake (14 miles) of the high Sierras in California and we sat around under shade trees around the lake enjoying post run "rest" and food, several girls were deeply into their reading as many are in AP and Advanced classes that always require a summer assignment classic novel read. When I spied one of our top runners reading "Catcher in the Rye" I was excited then I realized that this top student and top runner was just starting her read for an assignment that will be due on the first day of school - just a week from now! Yikes, one of my favorites to "teach" but then in the most recent decades - we cut out many novels just as you shared and the "Catcher" hasn't been in my lesson preparations for well over a decade.
I enjoy your words and I agree that reading is essential on so many levels and is a huge measure of the intellectual "health" of our society. Thank you so much for this topic. Keep showing us how to do the "basics" well and I'll add my credit card digits to this platform to show my appreciation for all the writes that I have already enjoyed for free thanks to Substack!
Thank you so much for this article - it's just what I needed! I feel like my cognitive ability is declining (and I'm just 30!). I struggle with my memory and feel like I have no interesting topics to add to my conversations as all I watch in my free time is trail running videos and Instagram crap! Earlier this year I've started blocking social media out during week days and trying to read a book for 30 mins in the evening instead. Not going to lie - it's been hard! I struggle to get into, my brain still feels like a sieve and a lot of the times I don't enjoy it (especially if I've had a very computer focused day at work). But the tips you've given here about rotating books, starting easy etc etc are so helpful!
I'm writing from Poland, where I live in a small town near Warsaw with five public libraries serving a population of 60,000. This provides residents with access to reading materials and offers an amazing opportunity (although the funding for the local football team is 100 times larger per city, showing how supporting reading is inexpensive). Now, as an adult, I have read extensively throughout my life. But it's not about me; I am especially proud that my 14-year-old daughter reads even more than I do, averaging 5 to 8 books each month. However, this is not very common, and I believe the issue stems from social media, which I also observe here. Young children especially struggle to concentrate on any activity for longer than 30 seconds.
And while we respect all ways of reading, for us, only reading paper books matters. The feel of the paper and the sound of turning pages gives us an even bigger dopamine rush :)
Steve, as a retired teacher, I believe this post should be in the hands of every teacher this summer before the start of the school year. Reading is something every teacher needs to foster in their students, no matter what subject or grade they teach. Maybe every teacher should be a reading teacher—I know I'm not the first person to say that.
I started teaching in 1978 and retired in 2020. Throughout those years, reading and books were always at the center of my teaching, especially reading with a pencil in hand. It's an approach that was taught for many years to incoming freshmen at Harvard: mark it up, write in the margins, and have a conversation with the author.
My wife was a first-grade teacher for more than 40 years, and reading was the most important thing she did with her students. Together, we built massive collections of fiction and nonfiction books, all paid for out of our own pockets. We spent countless summers and weekends attending library book sales and other used-book sales to find books for our classrooms.
Giving students choices in what they read was central to our philosophy, as was reading aloud to them every day. Those experiences helped create lifelong readers, and I believe they remain just as important today.
Thanks for writing this. I'd love to go for run with you and talk more about this.
I grew up a voracious reader. When I left home and started exploring who I was as an adult, I don’t think I read as much. And definitely not when I was working full time and doing school part time. I’m really happy to be diving deep back in with reading books (physical books are best for me!) and reading on Substack as well.
Thanks for writing this! I appreciated that you went into the multi-factorial causes, because we often don’t point to how changes in education affect us, but it’s quite sad.
When I was in school in the 1970’s in the central valley of California, from first grade to 5th, we had at least one full period of reading, sometimes two if the teacher also read to us.
SRA’s, and the little book catalog you could order form monthly, were standard, every kid in class read, everyday, and 90% bought books for themselves.
We had the SRA’s set up as completions as well with a board that showed who was on what level, and in younger grades, had a full 20 min of team question and answers competition.
It was fantastic.
On the subject of quitting, I agree, but this last year, my best friend from high school convinced me to revisit, and trudge through, two books that I had stalled on, even though I love the authors.
The first was Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell, I hated the first section, hated the movie. I adored each and every one of Mitchell’s other books, having read them all at least twice.
I finally powered through, and absolutely loved it, once it clicked.
The same scenario with The Dark Tower series by SK. I was an avid fan back in junior high and high school, and hated The Drawing of the Three when it came out, so vowed never to pick up another DT book, strangely the Talisman has always been my favorite.
I finally, just plowed on, and it ended fantastic, and the next 3 books were a speeding train of enjoyment at 7-900 pages a book, all finished in less than a week each.
These horribly useless statistics never take into account the overall growth in US population. The percentage reading books might be lower, but the number of books being read and the number of people reading is much higher. That’s why Barnes & Noble is opening 60 new stores for the 4th straight year and independent bookstores are thriving.
One addendum, those stats are all 3-4 years old, and utterly useless. How were they gathered? how many people participated? The "sky is falling" negative reading articles never address those things and they definitely don't address the boom period for bookstores right now.
I would lightly challenge the educators here. My graduate (MA and current PhD) education has been a firehose of texts. The idea that every text needs to be read closely doesn't jibe with the way things get assigned. You can't close read 1,200 pages a week and remain sane or social or employed in the internships and whatnot we need to both make ends meet and get jobs. I think similarly, we program kids' time to the absolute max. With travel sports, the time we and our parents spent reading is chewed up.
All to say, in a world where "content" is everywhere and students have busy lives--for better or worse but ostensibly for their own good--how do you ensure that the entire book you've assigned doesn't just become another task rather than something to be processed or savored?
That's another topic, but I think audiobooks are a great entry point.
To me, it's harder to sustain focus when listening than reading. But if more people are listening to longform books, there's no negative there. I'd rather have that then scrolling.
I had never heard of "Once a Runner", but I might look into it. Looking at the summary, it reminds me a bit of the real life story of Louie Zamperini. He may have become the first to run a sub 4:00 mile if Japan hadn't attacked Pearl Harbor. How many other future great athletes were lost in the carnage? We'll never know, but the aftermath is the landscape Roger Bannister emerged in. Truly compelling stories worth reading about.
Mark, get yourself a copy of Once A Runner. Then, move on to Parker's other two books, Racing the Rain and Again to Carthage: A Novel. Get them all in hardcover and pass them along to a new generation. John knows how to write running stories.
"The illusion of knowing" applies to so much today. Thank you for writing this and making all these connections. I see what you're saying and really appreciate the action steps.
Steve, Brilliant! This should be required reading for legislatures and school boards; the stats drive the point home. We collectively need to address this before we completely lose reading. Your remedies are on point, however, #3 should be #1. It all starts with parents and the home. This is the foundational piece that must be stressed; reading practises and examples at home set kids up for a life of reading. Reading to kids every night at bed and having a family read time, rather than movie night, will make reading an activity that they will enjoy and incorporate into their lives. What families do together will be repeated and passed down. We need to stop pointing the finger at phones and have a look in the mirror to see who is responsible for positive change.
Yep. The remedies are in no particular order, and I'm sure there's more we can do. But of course it starts at home! Which is part of the problem... Parents aren't reading either! So it doesn't get modeled or valued.
Hi Steve. This is great and truly important. I think it's especially important to come from someone who doesn't obviously have a personal/financial stake in these things. We all need to be saying that kids/people should be reading more.
One thing that I will add here to your section on environment is that it's not just the home we should be worried about. Schools have become digital wastelands with less well resourced libraries and fewer books that no one ever touches. Even schools that have "banned" phones still often happily hand out ipads and chromebooks with free access to the internet day and night. Kids are required to use internet based learning management tools to get assignments and interact with their teachers. It seems that we expect kids to be superhumans who will responsibly post an assignment and then turn off their computer to read a book. It's just dumb. Of course they're going to scroll. As a parent of teenagers who love to read books I have witnessed the constant struggle for them to find space for themselves to not be forced onto a screen or to get their friends out of theirs for a while. We've opted out of ipads at school. Just said no, and they remain a great students who actually talk to teachers. It doesn't have to be this way.
great addition...the chromebook, 1 to 1 tech was a disastrous move where education chased shiny objects instead of what worked.
Every school should build time into the school day for kids to read books of their own choosing. The library should be the central hub of every school at every grade level.
You become better at something by doing it and often. Then why not do that with reading during the school day. Let kids read.
It sure was when I was in school, but that was the 1970’s.🙄
I am becoming a "paid" subscriber today! I am a recently retired English teacher and longtime XC and track and field coach and talking books with my student/athletes was always a favorite pastime. Loved your "Once a Runner" reference as I have recommended and even gifted many of my runners over the years - especially the boys - this book. I had retired from coaching after 40 consecutive seasons and then after three years "off" agreed to help a new team for me with being an assistant cross country and high jump coach in the spring. I run/plod with the girls (I am helping an all-girls high school team in Sacramento) and the other day on day # 6 of running day camp where the topmost fit runners ran twice around Donner Lake (14 miles) of the high Sierras in California and we sat around under shade trees around the lake enjoying post run "rest" and food, several girls were deeply into their reading as many are in AP and Advanced classes that always require a summer assignment classic novel read. When I spied one of our top runners reading "Catcher in the Rye" I was excited then I realized that this top student and top runner was just starting her read for an assignment that will be due on the first day of school - just a week from now! Yikes, one of my favorites to "teach" but then in the most recent decades - we cut out many novels just as you shared and the "Catcher" hasn't been in my lesson preparations for well over a decade.
I enjoy your words and I agree that reading is essential on so many levels and is a huge measure of the intellectual "health" of our society. Thank you so much for this topic. Keep showing us how to do the "basics" well and I'll add my credit card digits to this platform to show my appreciation for all the writes that I have already enjoyed for free thanks to Substack!
Sincerely, Charles Bruns
Thank you so much for this article - it's just what I needed! I feel like my cognitive ability is declining (and I'm just 30!). I struggle with my memory and feel like I have no interesting topics to add to my conversations as all I watch in my free time is trail running videos and Instagram crap! Earlier this year I've started blocking social media out during week days and trying to read a book for 30 mins in the evening instead. Not going to lie - it's been hard! I struggle to get into, my brain still feels like a sieve and a lot of the times I don't enjoy it (especially if I've had a very computer focused day at work). But the tips you've given here about rotating books, starting easy etc etc are so helpful!
I'm writing from Poland, where I live in a small town near Warsaw with five public libraries serving a population of 60,000. This provides residents with access to reading materials and offers an amazing opportunity (although the funding for the local football team is 100 times larger per city, showing how supporting reading is inexpensive). Now, as an adult, I have read extensively throughout my life. But it's not about me; I am especially proud that my 14-year-old daughter reads even more than I do, averaging 5 to 8 books each month. However, this is not very common, and I believe the issue stems from social media, which I also observe here. Young children especially struggle to concentrate on any activity for longer than 30 seconds.
And while we respect all ways of reading, for us, only reading paper books matters. The feel of the paper and the sound of turning pages gives us an even bigger dopamine rush :)
Steve, as a retired teacher, I believe this post should be in the hands of every teacher this summer before the start of the school year. Reading is something every teacher needs to foster in their students, no matter what subject or grade they teach. Maybe every teacher should be a reading teacher—I know I'm not the first person to say that.
I started teaching in 1978 and retired in 2020. Throughout those years, reading and books were always at the center of my teaching, especially reading with a pencil in hand. It's an approach that was taught for many years to incoming freshmen at Harvard: mark it up, write in the margins, and have a conversation with the author.
My wife was a first-grade teacher for more than 40 years, and reading was the most important thing she did with her students. Together, we built massive collections of fiction and nonfiction books, all paid for out of our own pockets. We spent countless summers and weekends attending library book sales and other used-book sales to find books for our classrooms.
Giving students choices in what they read was central to our philosophy, as was reading aloud to them every day. Those experiences helped create lifelong readers, and I believe they remain just as important today.
Thanks for writing this. I'd love to go for run with you and talk more about this.
I grew up a voracious reader. When I left home and started exploring who I was as an adult, I don’t think I read as much. And definitely not when I was working full time and doing school part time. I’m really happy to be diving deep back in with reading books (physical books are best for me!) and reading on Substack as well.
Thanks for writing this! I appreciated that you went into the multi-factorial causes, because we often don’t point to how changes in education affect us, but it’s quite sad.
When I was in school in the 1970’s in the central valley of California, from first grade to 5th, we had at least one full period of reading, sometimes two if the teacher also read to us.
SRA’s, and the little book catalog you could order form monthly, were standard, every kid in class read, everyday, and 90% bought books for themselves.
We had the SRA’s set up as completions as well with a board that showed who was on what level, and in younger grades, had a full 20 min of team question and answers competition.
It was fantastic.
On the subject of quitting, I agree, but this last year, my best friend from high school convinced me to revisit, and trudge through, two books that I had stalled on, even though I love the authors.
The first was Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell, I hated the first section, hated the movie. I adored each and every one of Mitchell’s other books, having read them all at least twice.
I finally powered through, and absolutely loved it, once it clicked.
The same scenario with The Dark Tower series by SK. I was an avid fan back in junior high and high school, and hated The Drawing of the Three when it came out, so vowed never to pick up another DT book, strangely the Talisman has always been my favorite.
I finally, just plowed on, and it ended fantastic, and the next 3 books were a speeding train of enjoyment at 7-900 pages a book, all finished in less than a week each.
You never know.😎
Getting up from the computer now to go in the other room and pick up the novel I'm reading.
These horribly useless statistics never take into account the overall growth in US population. The percentage reading books might be lower, but the number of books being read and the number of people reading is much higher. That’s why Barnes & Noble is opening 60 new stores for the 4th straight year and independent bookstores are thriving.
One addendum, those stats are all 3-4 years old, and utterly useless. How were they gathered? how many people participated? The "sky is falling" negative reading articles never address those things and they definitely don't address the boom period for bookstores right now.
I would lightly challenge the educators here. My graduate (MA and current PhD) education has been a firehose of texts. The idea that every text needs to be read closely doesn't jibe with the way things get assigned. You can't close read 1,200 pages a week and remain sane or social or employed in the internships and whatnot we need to both make ends meet and get jobs. I think similarly, we program kids' time to the absolute max. With travel sports, the time we and our parents spent reading is chewed up.
All to say, in a world where "content" is everywhere and students have busy lives--for better or worse but ostensibly for their own good--how do you ensure that the entire book you've assigned doesn't just become another task rather than something to be processed or savored?
It’s by design
Did you discuss audio books? Is that reading? Purposely omitted?
That's another topic, but I think audiobooks are a great entry point.
To me, it's harder to sustain focus when listening than reading. But if more people are listening to longform books, there's no negative there. I'd rather have that then scrolling.
low-handing ease?