The Common Core declared War on Reading when it required that 70% of all texts be very, very boring.
Ideally, texts should also be irrelevant to modern life, such as the suggestion that kids learn to read train tables (instead of learning how to cheerfully help grandparents use the Amtrak app). Fortunately, there are many tried and true classroom techniques that teachers can use in The War on Reading.
- Spend a lot of time going over the boring things said in the last class meeting.
- Ask a lot of boring questions from the textbook and require that students arduously write out the boring answers by hand.
- Have students read long sections of the text in a bored voice.
- Be bored by the text yourself and make sure the kids know it.
- Explain that the only reason to read the boring text is to prepare for college which is in and of itself a very boring idea.