Why do teachers like to tell you what to read?

Motivation is at the heart of language learning and literacy. The interest we have in the subject we are reading is a major motivator for reading, enabling us to struggle with difficult texts and as a result, learn.

Here we are told to read the New Yorker to improve our SAT scores.Why the New Yorker?I have never had any interest in reading the New Yorker.

I was searching the Internet for Czech resources and discovered the Czech program offered at Oxford. It featured a reading list heavy to poetry. I don’t like poetry.

Why not encourage people to read what they like, but just push themselves a little in terms of the difficulty level.