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The Case for Supporting Reading for Pleasure in Secondary Schools

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The Case for Supporting Reading for Pleasure in Secondary Schools “Why Has She Stopped Reading?” The Case for Supporting Reading for Pleasure in Secondary Schools. Alexandra M-L Warsop Doctorate in Education School of Education and Lifelong Learning, University of East Anglia October 2014 ©“This copy of the thesis has been supplied on condition that anyone who consults it is understood to recognise that its copyright rests with the author and that use of any information derived there from must be in accordance with current UK Copyright Law. In addition, any quotation or extract must include full attribution.” 1 Abstract The aim of this study was to investigate why some children, who engage in reading for pleasure at primary school, stop reading once they have transitioned to secondary school. The study followed eight students from their last term of Year 6 primary education (10 to 11 year-olds) through to the end of their first term of Year 8 secondary education (12 to 13 year-olds). In this ethnographic interpretivist study I used a variety of methods including: observation, questionnaires and group conversations to discover the reasons why some students engage in less reading for pleasure once they begin their secondary school education. I employed thematic analysis to allow flexibility to my research and to provide a detailed and rich account. Some of the eight students involved in this study dramatically reduced the amount of reading which they engaged in and some continued to spend a similar amount of time engaging in reading for pleasure. Some students continued with familiar, safe, readerly texts and some students branched out to explore new genres and text types. This study provides insight into how the child as a reader changes once they move to secondary school and identifies what teachers need to know about the child to be able to facilitate reading for pleasure. New Year 7 students are concerned about perceived negative peer perceptions of readers and suggestions are made about the ways in which teachers and librarians can work with students to encourage reading for pleasure. A key finding of this study was that a precise understanding of Year 7 students as readers by secondary school English teachers is required for them to be able to facilitate students’ reading for pleasure. Suggestions are offered about how teachers can gain a greater understanding of their students as readers and suggestions are also offered about how to develop the child as a reader. 2 Acknowledgements There are many people to thank for their part in helping me complete this thesis. I should especially like to thank Jenifer Smith, for inspiring me to pursue this research and for helping me to climb over all of the barriers which were placed in my path. To the wonderfully communicative and interesting students who allowed me an insight into their reading lives, and without whom there would be no thesis, thank you, my life is richer for talking with you. Special thanks go to the schools for allowing me to explore reading in their educational establishments and to the parents of those great children. Thank you to Lily and Kirsty for comments on previous drafts and for helping me to find my voice. Finally, my thanks go to Simon, Rowan and Jasmine who helped me take this leap of faith. This writing is for you. 3 Contents 1 Introduction ....................................................................................................................... 8 2 The Importance of Reading for Pleasure ........................................................................... 12 3 Defining “Reading for Pleasure” ........................................................................................ 21 4 The National Curriculum 1989 to 2014 and Government Focus on Reading for Pleasure ... 28 5 Reading Surveys Exploring Children’s Reading for Pleasure – A Review ............................. 38 6 Research Design ............................................................................................................... 58 7 Selecting the Primary and Secondary Schools and Gaining Access ..................................... 62 8 The Schools Involved in the Research Project .................................................................... 68 9 Initial School-Based Observations ..................................................................................... 72 10 The Observational and Interview Setting .......................................................................... 75 11 The Questionnaire - Methodology .................................................................................... 86 12 The Research Participants ................................................................................................. 94 13 Group Conversations ...................................................................................................... 107 14 Defining “Readers” ......................................................................................................... 113 15 The Students: Their Reading Story – Summer 2010, The End of Year 6 ............................ 120 16 The Observational and Interview Setting – Secondary Schools ........................................ 165 17 The Research Participants: Questionnaire responses at the end of Year 7 ....................... 173 18 The Conversations in Years 7 and 8 ................................................................................. 183 19 Geeks ............................................................................................................................. 315 20 Conclusion ...................................................................................................................... 336 21 Bibliography ................................................................................................................... 351 22 Appendix 1 ..................................................................................................................... 362 23 Appendix 2 ..................................................................................................................... 377 24 Appendix 3 ..................................................................................................................... 387 4 Tables and Figures Table 1: The National Curricula For English ...................................................................................... 28 Table 2: Government Publications concerning the teaching of English ............................................. 33 Table 3: National Curriculum Attainment Target 2: Reading ............................................................. 35 Table 4: Whitehead’s results for the average number of books read during one month. .................. 39 Table 5: Whitehead’s results for the number of children choosing not to read ................................ 40 Table 6: Cole and Hall’s results for the average number of books read in the previous month ........ 43 Table 7: Coles and Hall’s results for the number of children choosing not to read ............................ 44 Table 8: Coles and Hall’s results for children’s views of reading by age ............................................ 44 Table 9: Hopper’s results for children reading a book at home ........................................................ 46 Table 10: Clark and Douglas’ results for reading frequency ............................................................. 50 Table 11: Clark and Douglas children choosing not to read or to rarely read .................................... 50 Table 12: Overview of research ....................................................................................................... 59 Table 13: Overview of research participants’ primary and secondary schools .................................. 61 Figure 1: Primary School A Library ................................................................................................... 77 Figure 2: Primary School A Library Stock .......................................................................................... 77 Figure 3: Primary School B Library ................................................................................................... 78 Figure 4: Primary School B beanbag area ......................................................................................... 78 Figure 5: Primary School .................................................................................................................. 79 Figure 6: Primary School C’s book display ........................................................................................ 79 Figure 7: Primary School C’s Book of the Term display board. .......................................................... 84 Table 14: Completion Rates for My Primary Questionnaires ............................................................ 87 Table 15: Completion Rates for My Secondary Questionnaires ........................................................ 88 Table 16: Average number of books read in the previous month my results .................................... 90 Table 17: Number of children reporting no reading in the previous month my results ..................... 91 Table 18: Positive attitudes towards reading ................................................................................... 91 Table 19: Jamie’s Primary Profile ..................................................................................................... 99 Table 20: Theo’s Primary Profile ...................................................................................................
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