Wilhelm Chapter One.

Well, I just finished chapter one of the Wilhelm book, and maybe I'm feeling more belligerent than usual today but this book is driving me crazy. Having read the full introduction and the first chapter the list of actual information I've gleaned so far is ridiculously short.
Mainly:

• Reading is good.

• Some students simply don't want to read, this is terrible.

• The reason these students don't want to read is because they've been encouraged to read only to look for meaning.
• Wilhelm's daughter Fiona is very cute.

It reminds me of one of those old Bill Nye episodes where Bill takes a simple scientific fact and expands that information into an hour of entertainment without really adding anything else. Of course I'm expecting the book to become more practical as I progress through it, but I really didn't think the first chapter had much to offer.

The main thing I did learn from the first chapter is that for a long time kids were turn to look at text in a very scientific way, searching just for meaning and not concentrating on the different emotions and ideas that the text elicits from them. It's easy to see why this was such a dominating way to teach because in many ways it's the easier path, and grading and lesson plan creation are likely simpler. It's also easy to see why a reading philosophy based on Efferent reading can let a lot of students slip through the cracks.