The death of writing

It goes without saying that if I'm able to publish my diary in a semi-public forum that writing is dead. My education in this art is limited to High School and a course vaguely titled 4.120 - English. Should have been called torture by making you read "great art" - most of which I would never pick up again, even if I were on a desert island with nothing else to read.
But, why is writing so hard? And for that matter, is reading becoming a lost skill?
I have just come back from listening to Joelle's class read. I do this once a month, and every month, I am amazed at how little some of these children improve. The one reading at the lowest level has improved some, I will give her that, but a lot of the kids are at exactly the same level as when I went in October. The books are repeats. At least I didn't have to listen to the "late" story again today, but why would any early childhood author write a story about "Little Bulldozer"? Have you heard six and seven year olds (who don't have fabulous diction) speak those words? It gets even better when "Big Bulldozer" comes on the scene to make "Little Bulldozer" feel bad. I can't give you the sound I hear - something like if you put your lips together tight, blow as much air as you can between your teeth and your lips and then let it all out in a "B" sound. Then say uh-doh-ze. Don't worry about l's or r's - the kids don't. I would love to hear each of them read a whole sentence without skipping words - did the authors have any idea that they were writing things that children would only read half of?
So I'm traumatized again.
However, I wouldn't want to write a children's book, so I suppose I can't complain too much. I don't really write anything, except what you read here. Apparently my lack of ambition in this subject has transferred to my eldest. Joelle will read anything you ask her to (and a lot that she hasn't been asked to...) but to get her to write- well, that's another problem.
I wonder why that is? Is it because we're both lazy perfectionists? Probably sounds like a dichotomy in terms, but we both like to have things perfect, even though neither of us wants to work too hard on anything. So for writing, where, of course, there is an art form, there is a way to format, you should try to use correct grammar, there are a lot of rules - is that just too much work? Should it have to be?
Anyway, I should run. Hopefully the piano tuner will be here in a few hours and I'd like to have my house a little bit cleaner by then. And maybe I should think about supper too...