My partner is a headteacher and you’d be amazed at exactly how shit some parents are.

Gavin

In the news today it was reported that the UK’s children have fallen outside of the world’s top ten rankings for literacy levels. I’m bracing myself for more stories of this nature in the years to come.

Matt.

There are lots of problems with childhood literacy and often it starts with the parents not having the ability to read the children’s bedtime stories and instill a love of reading.

It’s partly due to forcing children to attend school too early, particularly for boys.

On the copywriting side of things, for shorter copy I have to admire all James Brausch’s sales pages are seriously short, it’s either take it or leave it. Maybe because he’s established himself so well already that he can get away with it.

best regards

Gavin

This post was more speculatory then based on any hard evidence, and I was just trying to build a post around recent news stories on literacy levels, and hopefully provoke a few comments along the way.

I think the point I was trying to make was that as more of the wider UK population starts spending more time on the internet you’re going to encounter more people with lower reading ages. Half of the UK’s workforce is believed to have a reading age of only 11 so adjusting your copy for a wider demographic might be an issue in the future.

In terms of the reading age staying the same – the problem the UK faces is that it no longer has a healthy manufacturing industry and has to be able to raise skill levels and create new industries if the economy isn’t going to stagnate. This means overall literacy levels must be raised, which is proving to be a difficult task. I haven’t seen any hard evidence that suggests they’re falling apart from some social commentators continuing to blame the internet and TV for softening people’s brains.

I know I personally used to read a lot, but now, like you, I spend all day reading online and don’t read for pleasure half as much as I used to. Something I keep intending to change (if I could just switch off my laptop).

Thanks for taking the time to leave a comment and adding to the conversation.

Matt.

And in the US, there’s this: “According to the 1999 National Household Education Survey, 50% of the population aged 25 and over read a newspaper at least once a week, read one or more magazines regularly, and had read a book in the past 6 months.”
http://www.nifl.gov/nifl/facts/reading_facts.html#sadults

And this: “The largest increase in the Trade category came from Juvenile hardbound books, which rose at a compound growth rate of 19.6 percent from 2002 to 2005.”
http://www.publishers.org/industry/index.cfm

I agree with your point that writers should write simply. But that’s just good communication. Whether reading trends are downward is another matter entirely and I haven’t seen statistics to support it.

You have to be careful about this issue because when you ask people if they “read,” they might say no. But I’m guessing many people read all day long … reports, memos, e-mail, blogs, online newspapers, print newspapers, mail, catalogs, etc. People just don’t consider that to be “reading,” which is generally interpreted to mean reading for pleasure — novels and such.

If you ask me if I read much, I’ll likely say no. But in my copywriting business, I’m reading all day long. It’s just related to business and not necessarily related to printed “books.”

I use a range of tools for editing my writing: an ice pick, a surgeon’s knife and frequently, when sentences get too bloated, a heavy axe.

Thanks for your support, although I think there’s some stiff competition again this year which will hold me off the top.

Hi Shondra,

I’m glad you like the post because I gave my imagination a bit more rope to run with than usual, and hoped people wouldn’t take it too literally.

Matt.

I really enjoyed and agree with your article on writing shorter and simpler. I am a Creative Recruiter for Organic.com please take a look at our blog http://threeminds.organic.com and let me know what you think.

Shondra Weill
Senior Recruiter

Thanks for the nomination for Michael Steizner’s list, by the way! I returned the favor. Keep up the great posts!