Dinty W. Moore Quote

The idea that students don't know how to write clearly and precisely is as old as school itself, probably, but lately it seems as if students no longer know how to read either. It is true on my campus and from I can gather, on many other college campuses. The students understand words, sentences -- they are not illiterate -- but they don't seem to grasp the reasons for reading. They seem baffled when asked to take two thoughts, connect them, and form something new. They read James Baldwin or Henry David Thoreau and their primary reaction seems to be, Okay, now I've ready that. I'm done. As if the only goal in reading was to have looked at every word.

Dinty W. Moore

The idea that students don't know how to write clearly and precisely is as old as school itself, probably, but lately it seems as if students no longer know how to read either. It is true on my campus and from I can gather, on many other college campuses. The students understand words, sentences -- they are not illiterate -- but they don't seem to grasp the reasons for reading. They seem baffled when asked to take two thoughts, connect them, and form something new. They read James Baldwin or Henry David Thoreau and their primary reaction seems to be, Okay, now I've ready that. I'm done. As if the only goal in reading was to have looked at every word.

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About Dinty W. Moore

Dinty W. Moore (born August 11, 1955) is an American essayist and writer of both fiction and non-fiction books. He received the Grub Street National Book Prize for Non-Fiction for his memoir, Between Panic and Desire, in 2008 and is also author of the memoir To Hell With It: Of Sin and Sex, Chicken Wings, and Dante’s Entirely Ridiculous, Needlessly Guilt-Inducing Inferno, the writing guides The Story Cure, Crafting the Personal Essay, and The Mindful Writer, and many other books and edited anthologies.