A recent survey has shown that 1 in 6 teenagers fail to read a single book in a month. The poll of over 18,000 kids, aged 8-17, showed that less than half of those asked choose to read a single book outside of school each month.
This really isn't a problem. From personal experience, teenagers go through many phases. I barely read anything until I was about 14 and then I just started reading magazines which became wordier magazines which became short novels and I just finished The Shining on holiday (recommended, by the way).
But still, prepare for the onslaught of tired cliches: "Keats, King and Carroll are being replaced by Twitter, Facebook and MySpace!" and the like.
Michael Gove, the Education Secretary, said that children aged 11 "should read 50 books a year". This shows how out of touch both he and the mass media (I found this story on Reuters UK) are with kids.
Sure, as you get older, the feeling of relaxing with a paperback becomes more tempting but, with 11 year-olds, only by using eBooks could the Government ever hope to achieve such targets.
How often do you read/did you read when you were 11?
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WORD COUNT: 194
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