Eh, fellow italian I presume, and I concur half-way.

But did you really have "Promessi Sposi" as 12yo? I recall having it in the high school curriculum, some 5 years later.

It is downright illegible for a small kid anyway, I 100% agree.

For me, the teachers' recommended readings for the summer were things of the "good educational readings" kind (To Kill a Mockingbird, Fontamara, Cronache di Poveri Amanti, Il Giardino dei Finzi Contini etc) which are terribly boring for kids.

On the other hand, my class had a class library with more enjoyable stuff in it (Tolkien, Calvino, YA stuff).

yeah I'm pretty sure I was twelve, I was in a summer camp in Ireland and it was the year the blur great escape album came out, we had some leftover chapter to read as summer vacation and I had to bring the book with me. inthe nineties curriculum changed at breakneck speed so anything is possible anyway.

This is not first generation that dislikes mandatory readings. That did not changed. Primary purpose of school reading was not to be pleasure reading, it did not had to be and kids read more.

Kids often used to start read out of boredom, you used to find fun and easy to read junk in sch situation. Now kids play something or watch videos in that boredom situation.

Plus, now kids have more homework and organized activities. And easy to read fun junk is harder to find. But kids not liking what teacher assigned is not new.

>This is not first generation that dislikes mandatory readings. That did not changed. Primary purpose of school reading was not to be pleasure reading, it did not had to be and kids read more.

This whole mindset of copy & paste information into new citizen is nightmarish and has bred so much resentment/outright resistance it should be persecuted for destroying a young persons motivation and interest in new things.

Youtube and others are laying this idea, that knowledge has to be uninteresting and/or boring to ashes- series like extraHistory, smarterEveryDay, etc. show what is possible and how bad things actually are and where.

If someone must force his grownup tastes down upon a not grown up audience, and overrides rejection /disinterest with force - destroying one of the most vital things a new citizen has to bring to this society (intrinsic will to learn / yearning for discovery) the educator should be fired and banned from his / her profession.

You are aware that learning is not done just for pleasure purpose? The purpose is not always to make you like what you read. And that people unable to do "not fun" things or unable to deal with mild dislike of something are not the most vital parts of society. They are too fragile.

I am not bashing young people in general here. Most are not like that, even if they read less.

Also wtf it is with people that first reaction on anything is threat of firing. It seems like people can't discuss even curriculum without that.