The contact introduced me to literacy expert Molly Ness, who has experience in the ways short-form media creates “a skimmer brain” and weakens “reading stamina.” Ness has experience as a classroom teacher, a reading researcher, and a teacher educator, and she offers webinars, workshops, and other resources for educators. She’s served as an associate professor at Fordham University, has written six books, and is on the board of the World Literacy Foundation. Ness has a doctorate in reading education from the University of Virginia.

Our conversation has been lightly edited for clarity and style.

Scardilli: Throughout your career so far, what changes have you been seeing in students’ lack of focus and difficulty interacting with long texts? 

Ness: In recent years, we’ve definitely seen students having diminished focus on longer texts. Additionally, students have become increasingly accustomed to more surface-level reading—a cognitive phenomenon known as “shallow reading”—where we read in shorter chunks (social media posts, headline news, etc.), and the brain gets used to reading that is less reflective and not as deeply engaged.

Scardilli: In what ways is the current preference for short-form media hurting literacy? What does “a skimmer brain” and weakened reading stamina look like for students?

Ness: When students are only accustomed to short-form reading, they miss out on opportunities for deeply engaging and reflective reading. They may struggle with following a character, a plot, or a timeline across an extended period of reading. Also missed are opportunities for critical literacy, where students synthesize information across an argument, weigh evidence, and examine the subtle messages in a text. 

Scardilli: What advice would you give librarians for choosing the best digital tools for encouraging active reading?

Ness: Librarians should prioritize digital tools that offer students choice—choice of what they read and where to read it. It’s also advantageous to have digital tools that support students’ comprehension of what they read—the ability to click on unfamiliar vocabulary, text annotation features that they can return to as they write about what they read, and bookmarking. Digital tools that track reading progress as a way to motivate students are also useful.

Scardilli: Speaking of these digital tools, how has Sora helped you in your work? What’s its biggest strength when it comes to helping students?

Ness: In my work with schools, Sora supports teachers by providing immediate, easy access to assigned texts—as well as enhancing teachers’ abilities to create text sets, showcase titles, and select high-leverage vocabulary words. 

Scardilli: Is there anything else you’d like to share about the current and/or future state of literacy?

In a time when reading scores are stagnant and reading for pleasure is on the decline, we must encourage students to read in whatever format they prefer and select—for many busy students on the go, audiobooks and the digital tools of Sora empower them as readers. I’m also seeing increasing conversations about limiting ed tech in the classroom, particularly for early-grade students. Not all ed tech is created equal.