Mass Media: We have seen that the Oxford English Dictionary contains 171,476 words in current use, whereas a vocabulary of just 3000 words provides coverage for around 95% of common texts. If you do the math, that's 1.75% of the total number of words in use.


Children, Adult novels: You can start reading simpler (children's) books with 7000 word families (each word only counts once for singular and plural, verbs only count once for all of their conjugations etc). For a very complex book like "Moby Dick", you need around 18000 and up.

I totally agree - you are learning more diction/vocab, writing styles, and grammar when you read a variety of NOVELS in stead of popular press.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Hope not, you only need to know about 500 different words and cliches to read a mass media newspaper in America nowadays.

What information do you base this statement on?

2000 kanji to read Japanese newspaper.

I learned the same info on "words you need to read an English newspaper" as well. I was an Asian languages and linguistics major. It's amazingly low and low brow diction in US newspapwers. Maybe WSJ and FT ramps it up but otherwise, very simple English even once you account for and, the, then, for, etc.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:And in my day we read Cliff Notes, not the actual books assigned. My kids read Spark Notes, so it doesn't really matter what you want them to read, they will if they are interested, but most are not reading the assigned books.

In my day, I actually read the books. My children also read the books that were not assigned because MCPS has dumbed down the curriculum. Cliff Notes and Spark Notes can only carry you so far. Students who take short cuts cheat themselves out of the opportunity to form their own interpretations and experience from reading the original source.

So did I. But lots of other people didn't.

Anonymous wrote:And in my day we read Cliff Notes, not the actual books assigned. My kids read Spark Notes, so it doesn't really matter what you want them to read, they will if they are interested, but most are not reading the assigned books.

In my day, I actually read the books. My children also read the books that were not assigned because MCPS has dumbed down the curriculum. Cliff Notes and Spark Notes can only carry you so far. Students who take short cuts cheat themselves out of the opportunity to form their own interpretations and experience from reading the original source.

Anonymous wrote:

Hope not, you only need to know about 500 different words and cliches to read a mass media newspaper in America nowadays.

What information do you base this statement on?

And in my day we read Cliff Notes, not the actual books assigned. My kids read Spark Notes, so it doesn't really matter what you want them to read, they will if they are interested, but most are not reading the assigned books.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Students who don't grow up reading becomes adults that don't read. The net result is a population that gets their ideas / news from Instagram, Snapchat, or heaven forbid, Facebook (no one under 30 uses Twitter anymore).

The death of newspapers is a result. The last Presidential Election demonstrated the dangers unvetted information can cause. The downward spiral of our democracy is a direct link to people making decisions from the hip without taking the time to read and sort through multiple sources of information. MCPS is making our children digital zombies by increasing screen time and decreasing the material taught.

There's probably way more reading today than there used to be - it's just that people are reading on their electronic devices, rather than in print on paper.

Are you really equating reading news articles with reading high quality novels?!

Hope not, you only need to know about 500 different words and cliches to read a mass media newspaper in America nowadays.

Anonymous wrote:Political and social engineering agenda of central office.

Overcrowding. A whole lot of Hispanic immigrants needing services like ESOL and FARMS that our system is struggling to handle.

Lowering of educational standards to show that the achievement gap is being bridged.

Lack of differentiation in students. Smoke and mirror grading.

Poorly trained teachers. Lack of robust and scalable curriculum and lack of textbooks.

Bloated administration at central office and school.

Large class sizes.

Need of more classroom aides for teachers.

Teachers being forced to keep disruptive students in their classrooms.

You hit every nail on the head. Bravo! This sums it up perfectly. I have so many regrets sending my kids through MCPS. It is a disaster.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Students who don't grow up reading becomes adults that don't read. The net result is a population that gets their ideas / news from Instagram, Snapchat, or heaven forbid, Facebook (no one under 30 uses Twitter anymore).

The death of newspapers is a result. The last Presidential Election demonstrated the dangers unvetted information can cause. The downward spiral of our democracy is a direct link to people making decisions from the hip without taking the time to read and sort through multiple sources of information. MCPS is making our children digital zombies by increasing screen time and decreasing the material taught.

There's probably way more reading today than there used to be - it's just that people are reading on their electronic devices, rather than in print on paper.

Are you really equating reading news articles with reading high quality novels?!

No, of course not. Reading news articles is reading news articles. Reading novels is reading novels. However, both are reading. And one might with equal justification ask, Are you really equating reading novels with reading news articles?

Teaching good quality literature shows students to expose themselves to a variety of thoughts, ideas, cultures, beliefs, and use of vocabulary. Critiquing works, comparing and contrasting them, analyzing the language and philosophy broadens student minds so as adults they are willing to do the same. Defending your interpretation and ideas about a work of literature helps a student learn to be an effective and persuasive writer. The digital age is creating zombie adults who passively votes for whomever has the most and best soundbites without delving into the issues and experience of the candidate.

+1000

All of this.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Students who don't grow up reading becomes adults that don't read. The net result is a population that gets their ideas / news from Instagram, Snapchat, or heaven forbid, Facebook (no one under 30 uses Twitter anymore).

The death of newspapers is a result. The last Presidential Election demonstrated the dangers unvetted information can cause. The downward spiral of our democracy is a direct link to people making decisions from the hip without taking the time to read and sort through multiple sources of information. MCPS is making our children digital zombies by increasing screen time and decreasing the material taught.

There's probably way more reading today than there used to be - it's just that people are reading on their electronic devices, rather than in print on paper.

Are you really equating reading news articles with reading high quality novels?!

No, of course not. Reading news articles is reading news articles. Reading novels is reading novels. However, both are reading. And one might with equal justification ask, Are you really equating reading novels with reading news articles?

Teaching good quality literature shows students to expose themselves to a variety of thoughts, ideas, cultures, beliefs, and use of vocabulary. Critiquing works, comparing and contrasting them, analyzing the language and philosophy broadens student minds so as adults they are willing to do the same. Defending your interpretation and ideas about a work of literature helps a student learn to be an effective and persuasive writer. The digital age is creating zombie adults who passively votes for whomever has the most and best soundbites without delving into the issues and experience of the candidate.

Political and social engineering agenda of central office.

Overcrowding. A whole lot of Hispanic immigrants needing services like ESOL and FARMS that our system is struggling to handle.

Lowering of educational standards to show that the achievement gap is being bridged.

Lack of differentiation in students. Smoke and mirror grading.

Poorly trained teachers. Lack of robust and scalable curriculum and lack of textbooks.

Bloated administration at central office and school.

Large class sizes.

Need of more classroom aides for teachers.

Teachers being forced to keep disruptive students in their classrooms.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Students who don't grow up reading becomes adults that don't read. The net result is a population that gets their ideas / news from Instagram, Snapchat, or heaven forbid, Facebook (no one under 30 uses Twitter anymore).

The death of newspapers is a result. The last Presidential Election demonstrated the dangers unvetted information can cause. The downward spiral of our democracy is a direct link to people making decisions from the hip without taking the time to read and sort through multiple sources of information. MCPS is making our children digital zombies by increasing screen time and decreasing the material taught.

There's probably way more reading today than there used to be - it's just that people are reading on their electronic devices, rather than in print on paper.

Are you really equating reading news articles with reading high quality novels?!

No, of course not. Reading news articles is reading news articles. Reading novels is reading novels. However, both are reading. And one might with equal justification ask, Are you really equating reading novels with reading news articles?

No of course not. My point is that they’re totally different.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Students who don't grow up reading becomes adults that don't read. The net result is a population that gets their ideas / news from Instagram, Snapchat, or heaven forbid, Facebook (no one under 30 uses Twitter anymore).

The death of newspapers is a result. The last Presidential Election demonstrated the dangers unvetted information can cause. The downward spiral of our democracy is a direct link to people making decisions from the hip without taking the time to read and sort through multiple sources of information. MCPS is making our children digital zombies by increasing screen time and decreasing the material taught.

There's probably way more reading today than there used to be - it's just that people are reading on their electronic devices, rather than in print on paper.

Are you really equating reading news articles with reading high quality novels?!

No, of course not. Reading news articles is reading news articles. Reading novels is reading novels. However, both are reading. And one might with equal justification ask, Are you really equating reading novels with reading news articles?

Anonymous wrote:Yes, this a huge issue. Not the only one, but huge. The elephant in the room. W School Culture alarmed me enough as a teacher at a DCUM-lauded feeder MS, that I can’t imagine sending my own child there or the receiving HS.

It amazes me that issues about gangs, illegal aliens, and the influx of poor immigrants coming into the county school system are completely deleted on this thread, but continuously bashing white people is welcome and encouraged.

Talk about the elephant in the room.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Students who don't grow up reading becomes adults that don't read. The net result is a population that gets their ideas / news from Instagram, Snapchat, or heaven forbid, Facebook (no one under 30 uses Twitter anymore).

The death of newspapers is a result. The last Presidential Election demonstrated the dangers unvetted information can cause. The downward spiral of our democracy is a direct link to people making decisions from the hip without taking the time to read and sort through multiple sources of information. MCPS is making our children digital zombies by increasing screen time and decreasing the material taught.

There's probably way more reading today than there used to be - it's just that people are reading on their electronic devices, rather than in print on paper.

Are you really equating reading news articles with reading high quality novels?!