Are reading and writing falling by the wayside due to the surge in technology, especially hand held devices?

I have been a teacher of English, reading, and ESOL (English as a second language) for more than twenty years. When I first started teaching, we had one reading teacher for a high school of more than four thousand students. There were 20 reading teachers at that same high school when I transferred to a different school. I noticed that the increase of cell phones affected my students' writing because of the use of text messaging abbreviations and shorter choppy sentences written for speed. Reading research sources for critical thinking skills also began to suffer because students would simply look up topics on their phones without reading in depth from many different authors. I ask this question because I have heard many officers and NCOs complain about the reading and writing skills of newer recruits. Reading SOPs, regulations, Field Manuals, and Technical Manuals are essential for proficiency and promotion. Writing is a mandatory skill for soldier evaluations, debriefings and field reports, and award recommendations. Every student I teach in middle school has a phone on them (some parents insist that their child must have a phone in case they need to make contact with them). It is a struggle every day to get them to focus on the skills I am teaching rather than playing music, videos, and games. I have heard that this is even a problem in BCT, Boot Camp, and advanced training.