I was a voracious reader growing up, took honors and AP English all through school and studied English in college and I fell out of reading so deeply for many years as an adult. I’m horrified to think about what I would have missed if I hadn’t been expected to read entire books.
"In 1976, about 40 percent of high-school seniors said they had read at least six books for fun in the previous year, compared with 11.5 percent who hadn’t read any. By 2022, those percentages had flipped." www.theatlantic.com/magazine/arc...
To read a book in college, it helps to have read a book in high school.
My parents read me a book every night before bed from as early as I can remember but I also had to read 20 minutes every day starting in fourth or fifth grade (and read every Babysitters’ Club book as a result) and read increasingly complicated novels for classes from middle school on.
I remember being in middle school, reading novels in class (I was not a perfect student) & the teachers being absolutely unwilling to tell a student(?!) to stop reading(?!) which I took advantage of. I also remember being bullied at lunch by kids who couldn't believe I'd rather read than socialize.