this post was submitted on 30 Jul 2026
39 points (89.8% liked)

Ask Lemmy

40648 readers
1124 users here now

A Fediverse community for open-ended, thought provoking questions


Rules: (interactive)


1) Be nice and; have funDoxxing, trolling, sealioning, racism, toxicity and dog-whistling are not welcomed in AskLemmy. Remember what your mother said: if you can't say something nice, don't say anything at all. In addition, the site-wide Lemmy.world terms of service also apply here. Please familiarize yourself with them


2) All posts must end with a '?'This is sort of like Jeopardy. Please phrase all post titles in the form of a proper question ending with ?


3) No spamPlease do not flood the community with nonsense. Actual suspected spammers will be banned on site. No astroturfing.


4) NSFW is okay, within reasonJust remember to tag posts with either a content warning or a [NSFW] tag. Overtly sexual posts are not allowed, please direct them to either !asklemmyafterdark@lemmy.world or !asklemmynsfw@lemmynsfw.com. NSFW comments should be restricted to posts tagged [NSFW].


5) This is not a support community.
It is not a place for 'how do I?', type questions. If you have any questions regarding the site itself or would like to report a community, please direct them to Lemmy.world Support or email info@lemmy.world. For other questions check our partnered communities list, or use the search function.


6) No US Politics.
Please don't post about current US Politics. If you need to do this, try !politicaldiscussion@lemmy.world or !uspolitics@lemmy.world


7) No Hit-and-Run questions.
Please don't delete your post for no apparent reason. If you plan on deleting a question later, say so in the post, or if you feel that you have a good reason to remove it, message a mod beforehand. It's not fair to the ones who took their time to answer, and it's not in the spirit of the community.


Reminder: The terms of service apply here too.

Partnered Communities:

Tech Support

No Stupid Questions

You Should Know

Reddit

Jokes

Ask Ouija


Logo design credit goes to: tubbadu


founded 3 years ago
MODERATORS
 

I love audiobooks and consume them frequently but I personally don't call it reading. It doesn't feel like the same activity to me. What do you think?

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] GatesMcBalmer@lemmy.world 15 points 21 hours ago (2 children)

One of my kid's schools had a wild debate about this for their yearly charity "Readathon." The kids get sponsors to sign up to pledge the amount of money they will donate for each book the kid reads during the readathon. Parents are expected to sign off that their kid really did the reading for all the books they put on their sheet. Other than that its on the honor system. They've been doing it for 60+ years.

The kids don't get any prizes but they do get certificates of recognition for various levels of achievement. It came up this year, that some parents count audiobooks and others don't. They have been doing it like this for ome years now but it was never discussed before. The rules don't say anything about audiobooks but they were written back when audiobooks weren't common.

We had some seriously intense discussions in the Parents Charter (the name for our PTA) and lots of people have strong feelings about this! In the end the agreement was that transparency is best so the form has been updated with one side for audiobooks and one side for books. For purpose of donation they are counted the same.

[–] emb@lemmy.world 15 points 21 hours ago (1 children)

This is one area where I think the distinction is actually important!

For kids, they're learning to read. Heavy, repeated practice decoding and interpreting printed characters is the point.

Ultimately the activity of reading changes as you get older, into receiving new information and perspectives. At that point an audiobook is pretty much at parity. But earlier on in elementary and even middle grades, kids really need the actual reading IMO.

I have a relative who vastly prefers audiobooks. But his wife has to keep reminding him, don't let their daughter take that shortcut. She has to actually learn to read (and read well) first.

[–] GatesMcBalmer@lemmy.world 4 points 20 hours ago

I agree and for my kids that is the rule.

[–] Rhynoplaz@lemmy.world 10 points 21 hours ago

This is a tricky one. I've already posted a comment that may seem VERY contradictory to this one, but in this case, I think the kids should actually be reading.

The point of the readathon (aside from fundraising) is to get kids to practice reading, not to consume as much media as possible. Kids are already really good at that.

It would be like the band teacher allowing kids to listen to someone playing the trumpet instead of practicing themselves.