#please listen to Sold a Story but only if you want to rage vomit.

[isan0rt]

This post makes me want to tear my fucking hair out every time I see it. I feel like an old fogey but are you fucking kidding me?? THIS is WHY the reading comprehension on this site is piss poor. TWENTY FIVE THOUSAND people apparently relate to "I don't look up unfamiliar words in the dictionary the first time I encounter them, I just guess at what they mean, and then continue just guessing at what it means and if it makes sense going forward'? Without having any sense that that's...a problem?? That that's not actually comprehension of the sentence?? I read books constantly as a kid (many of them old-timey!) and yet have literally never had the problem described in the op because I owned a goddamn dictionary and I looked unfamiliar words up in it.

Like, I understand this is not the fault of The Kids and the schools have been teaching kids to """"""read""""" (read: guess what the sentence means with no real comprehension) like Predictive AI for decades now but like. I'm just floored reading the notes in here that "haha yeah I just know it makes sense I don't know what it means" is an acceptable state of affairs for people who consider themselves well read. If you don't know what it means you're not actually understanding the sentence!! You are acting as a human chatGPT.

You understand why that's bad, right?? You understand why this causes fights on this site and the wider internet, why people attack you because they didn't comprehend a post you made?? When people are just guessing at reading and at what words mean?? Words mean things!! You can't guess the meaning of unfamiliar words and expect to understand the meaning of a complex work!! You don't need to be able to drop the dictionary definition by memory but you need to be able to at least paraphrase or rephrase what the word means.

Dictionary.com is free. You have access to the internet if you're on Tumblr. I still look up unfamiliar words now the first time I encounter them, every time, on the spot, with my magic internet device grafted to my hand at all times. If someone tells me I'm misusing a word I also look it up, on the spot, and correct myself going forward if I'm actually wrong about the meaning.

I'm not also misinterpreting the meaning of the post here, or at least the way it's being taken, because I went through the tags and it's full of people saying specifically that they don't know what a variety of common words actually mean and have never been inclined to actually find out and they think this is a relatable joke instead of a catastrophic failure of our education system.

Anyway if this is you it's not your fault but please bookmark dictionary.com and also take a listen to the podcast Sold a Story to find out how you have been completely fucked by Marie Clay and by Big Reading Recovery.

#I'm not reblogging the post itself cuz that seems mean. #i get that people have to be taught to read and that the kids are not being taught to actually read text #please listen to Sold a Story but only if you want to rage vomit. #like. someone in the tags was like 'haha i don't know what facetious means just that it's a spicy mean word' my friend #facetious means 'acting like you're serious but you're joking' #like the notes were full of people listing out incredibly common words #and having no indication that they intended to look them up even while listing out words they don't know what they mean!! #i just don't understand it. look it up!! on your phone!! in your hand right now!!! you could know!! #not knowing how to PRONOUNCE a word you've only seen read is completely different but not knowing the MEANING is an easily fixable problem #I'm just flabbergasted. Reading by vibes. I can't even. #i already hated the concept of 'vibes' but if i ever hear the word 'vibes' said seriously again I'm flinging myself into the Mystic River #i will swim away never to be seen again