Atlantic article on why this generation doesn’t read for pleasure

[KungFuPanda]

3 hours ago, Dmmetler said:

I admit, I'm going digital more and more in my classes and lessons just due to cost. 

 

Almost all the materials that used to be in print are now digital. Yes, you can theoretically print them (at least some of them), but they're often full color, very graphical, and take a lot of pages to print. So what used to be Music Express Magazine, which came with a pack of magazines for your students every month that had sheet music in them, plus a teacher's edition and CD, and included a mix of contemporary and traditional is now EEiClassroom. It costs LESS per month than it cost me 20+ years ago. But it's clearly designed for Smartboards or Projectors, or to be loaded on a digital classroom and accessed on student devices. 

 

Noteflight Learn comes with a premium music library of thousands of pieces. For the cost of 2 octavos/kid, I can give each of my students a really good notation program-and a library of sheet music. Plus it has the piano part recorded, so I can use that if I need to conduct or to assist students. And most of my middle and high schoolers have a device they can pull it up on with them at all times anyway-and they're a lot less likely to forget their phone or tablet than their music folder.  

 

I'm still getting print music for my private students, but I can see where it's going digital there, too.  Alfred and Hal Leonard and pretty much all the major publishers are available on Kindle, have their own apps, or both.  And if we have a digital version that they can access anywhere, it won't matter if they don't bring their music, because I can pull it up on my iPad, they can pull it up at Dad's House vs Mom's, and they can't accidentally leave it on the school bus, on the sidelines at little league, or in their other backpack. 

 

I don't like it. But financially, I'm not sure it's worth spending about $5 extra per book, once you add in shipping, or the cost of printing page after page for my general music classes to avoid going digital. 

This is a bit of a side topic, but I saw an add the other day for a device that projects sewing patterns onto your cutting board. That looked so cool to me. 

[mom2scouts]

On 7/27/2023 at 9:42 PM, Terabith said:

My kids consumed a HUGE amount of literature/ text when they were under 10, via me reading to them and audiobooks and books they read to themselves.  Once screens entered the picture, it dropped considerably, especially when they went to public school where there were no rules about no phones during the school day.  

The advantage of this is that they can text my homeschooled daughter for help and get explanations of their math and grammar lessons. LOL! 

[Terabith]

4 minutes ago, mom2scouts said:

The advantage of this is that they can text my homeschooled daughter for help and get explanations of their math and grammar lessons. LOL! 

My husband basically conducted algebra 2 class by text message because the class was assigned to a series of short term substitutes who didn’t know algebra, and they were expected to teach themselves math to keep up with all the other algebra 2 classes.