Why deep reading matters in the age of AI

Assessment data

National assessments such as the Annual Status of Education Report (ASER) and the National Achievement Survey (NAS), remind us that a large proportion of Indian children in elementary grades struggle with grade-level reading. While many can decode or sound out words, they find it difficult to comprehend extended texts, connect ideas, or interpret meaning.

Responding to this concern, the National Curriculum Framework for School Education (NCF-SE 2023) places reading at the heart of curricular aims, emphasising meaning-making, analysis, interpretation, imagination, and sustained engagement with texts across languages and disciplines. In doing so, it recognises deep reading not merely as a functional skill but as a core and critical competency essential for thinking, communication, and democratic participation.

Screen exposure

Across Indian households, screen exposure has quietly become a dominant part of childhood. According to a recent meta-analysis by researchers at AIIMS Raipur, children under five years spend an average of 2.22 hours a day on screens, double the safe limit recommended by health authorities such as the World Health Organization (WHO) and the Indian Academy of Paediatrics (IAP). Even infants under two years were found to be exposed to screens for over an hour daily. Younger children watch animated videos, while older ones scroll through reels, social media, gaming apps, and online tutoring platforms. These digital spaces are designed for speed content, fast reactions, and constant switching;, a rhythm that works against the slow, sustained attention deep reading requires.

This constant stimulation reshapes attention, as the mind becomes trained to scan, rather than linger; to react, rather than reflect. The slow, immersive attention required for reading feels irrelevant. Stillness, once a natural part of childhood, has become fragile.

Schools across India are introducing AI-based tools, adaptive tutors, automated assessments, personalised practise systems, and content generators. While these can help diagnose learning gaps, offer immediate feedback, and support teachers with large classes, they cannot cultivate depth.

Artificial intelligence (AI) simplifies complexity. It optimises, condenses, and speeds up. Without a literacy-first approach, AI risks amplifying superficial engagement rather than strengthening comprehension. If children grow up expecting instant clarity, they may lose the resilience needed to engage with complex texts, layered narratives, or contradictory ideas, all of which are essential to bothlearning and citizenship.

Deep reading builds vocabulary, strengthens attention, and develops cognitive stamina. But its most powerful impact is on the imagination and the inner life. Slowly reading a story lets a child enter unfamiliar worlds, encounter different perspectives, feel emotions not their own, and question what they know. These dispositions — empathy, reflection, doubt, interpretation — are uniquely human capacities. No app, AI tool, or screen can replace them.

In an era shaped by algorithms and instant information, deep reading is not a luxury. It is a survival skill. We talk endlessly about future readiness, 21^st-century skills, and technological transformation, but these ambitions are hollow if children are not taught to think deeply. Deep reading, the beauty of holding the page, is the quiet foundation on which all meaningful learning stands.

Screens and AI will continue to shape childhood, but they must not be allowed to replace the slow, transformative experience of getting lost in a book. The future will belong not to those who consume the most information, but to those who can pause long enough to understand and internalise it.

Views expressed are personal.

The writer is faculty at Azim Premji University, Bengaluru.