Children's Book Reading Habits: Anew Criterion Literacy
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DOCUMENT RES ED. r 999 CS 008 660 At1111111011 Wilson, Paul T.And Others I '114 Children's Book Reading Habits: ANew Criterion Literacy. Reading Education Report No. 63. I I49 VITT I ON Bolt, Beranek and Newman, Inc., Cambridge,Mass. ; Illinois Univ.,Urbana. Center for the Study of Reading. AGENCY National Inst. of Education (ED), Washington,DC. DATE Jan 86 400-83.-0030 32p. PE Information Analyses (070) EDRS PRICE ME01/PCO2 Plus Postage. ,DESCIIIPTORS Books; Elementary Education; *Elementary School Students; *Literacy; *Reading Habits; Reading Interests; Reading Materials; Reading Research; *Recreational Reading; *Supplementary Reading Materials; Theory Practice Relationship ENPIflERS Reading Motivation %FACT To the traditional arguments forteaching children to read ,can be adwAded thecontemporary idea that literacy is a tool, the neeeesiry skil,l for full participationin society, and the ticket to socielmobility, and success. Newreasons for reading books have -eniei0,fremrmr,--ecent gains in the understanding of the comprehension r6cess and, thaftfre nature of language and languagelearning. However, s,tiidenti whose , sole expoSure toreading is through stories in the asaJeaders fiwencounteredin most schools arenot likely to develop much,literest = in reading. Ina sampling analysis of school children, book -reading t=,ime ,emerged consistentlyas the best predictor of fithgrade 'comenprehension, vocabulary size,reading speed, and gains in comprehesialon between second'and fifth grade. Ifhe goal of a "mitor-e,literate,..kmerice is tobe achieved, children must be giVen oppoetnnities 1L-to read, motivation to read,and access to books, a ,vitaX ingredieirmt. Many children do not havebooks at home, and the prressencerof 'a yanTariety of books in school classroomsis absolutely cruca1to reaeding development. Learningto read must be viewed as ,ther_piocess of acquiring the reading habit, and literacymust be viewevdas the car e gul a r exercise of reading skillsthrough reading booilc, (RA) *********************** * ducti-aons supplied by EDRS are the best that from the original document. can be made 1**************************************************** ReadthgEducation ReporArt No. 63 anum's BOOK READING- HABITS: A DIN.CRITEKTON FOR LIACTERACY Paul T-lillson, 'Richard G. Anderson, sOlLinda C Fie14Il1ng University0fIllinois'at Urbzcoana7Champ January 1986 University of Illinois at Urbana-Champeign ltrt Beranek and Newman Inc. 51 Gerty Drive _ It11bu1ton Street Champaign, Illinois61SZO IthAbridge,' Massachusetts 02238 lhe work upon whiCh:this paicat on was'basee!edwas performed pursUant to Contract No. 400-81-0030d the.NationaL br:nstitute ofEducation' does not, however, necessarily reflect the,viajlewsof:thelagency. t.DEFFETRENT OF FOOOFTION DtIO4Elkosoonal Fieseeron firicIimOrOvefOerOr.nt EVI,CAPONAL RESOURCES INFORNIATIOFFoN CENTER fERIC) tLlhI di-foment hos Feely repfeoncinni era from me Demon or orwrototiee=n rIfnL . Mor changes haw) peon moos to imorotetowe ifintktion PuSIFF s Pweol view or opinions stated le this octwj MO100 not nePessarity represent Pfficiimeree pOlition Of OOlicy ')3lookReading Habits Children's Book Reading Habits: A New Criterion For Literacy Education . has produced a vast population able to read but unable to distinguish what is worth reading social history George Macau ley Trevelyan Throughou_ history, concen about reading and writing has ebbed and flowed.In this country, particularly over the last 30 years or so, the tide in, reading has 'been rising. of seeming decline in SAT scaresa growing awareness of adu illiteracy outcries about phonics _d management by objective schemes are all symptoms ofthepersist ng interest inreading. The currentemphasis in school instruction,however, has been awn explicit focuson the component skills ofreading -etherthan reading itself. According to data in the Reading Report Card, one might imagine that American schools are doing an effective job of teaching reading skills (NAEP, 1985). The decline in SAT seoe has levelled of ore minority children e pecially seem learning to read. Progress is still needed in teaching the intermediate and advanced level skills, but the picture is generally positive:Achievement test scores are rising. Are test scores the only standard by which to evalua efficacy of school reading progra ? Ought we not have some concern about the kindsofreading Americans aredoing? FrOm ou Book Reading Habits own research, it appears hat Trevelyan's observationabout may well be true America Test scoresarean undicator of how well students perform some reading,skinstauabt in school. By no means, however:, are test scores a sufficientpredictor:ofwhether Student- atually read. Our res arcbove the la five years, in fact shows only that thcse who caricead may.Many don't. Why shouldn X reading programa bee aluated on the basis of their out-of7-schooloutcomes- -he amountof real reading students do,on!Ilomany books, magazines, newspapers,' even comic books:,that -tiudents read in a year? Why shoUldn't the "level of literay in. Aime ica today bemeasued not only by , test C- e--l3ut bythe,aumoun readingthat Americans this paper first e will review the traditional arguments and the new re earchbes(e forwhy children should develop good :book ,reading habits SecA3ndWe will provide a summaxy of our investigations o book..reading Children:do...outside- Choel. 'We foemdgmLitive,replcable ,relationa:between the amount of-out-of choolt;: k reading and test scores. Third will point out br efly,s mwe of the,:social and educational ' implications of our flndLTlgs Finally,: we will:diicuss th& , importance of aCces5to ,b4DCks for developing children's reading habits. 4 Book Reading Habits 1,11- Should Children Read Books? Books are not men and yet theyare alive, They are man's memory and his aspiration, The link between his present and hispast, The tools he builds with. IllsE burned the books Steven Vincent Benet Books are the respository of all knowledge,the storehouse f the wisdom of the ages. Books have been a unique and powerful , means of passing on the heritage of, world culture. When we read books, we trarlscLnd la al boundaries ofspace and time and broaden our experience- _f the world. Nat only do we open ourselves to the ideas of others;we also have the possibility of direct encounters with thegreat minds cf history. These are the traditionalarguments,:for teaching children to reath -ore conte porary aspect of these arguments is the idea that literacy is a tool. Reading opens, the door to vast arrays of new information Access:to more:information gives ,people the power o makebetter decisions.People who read wellare better informed consumersand voters. They 1- more control over their lives And the possibility making a greater numbe choices'. Reading, thus is the necessary skill for full participationin our society, the ticket to social mobility andsuccess. 'New reasona for reading books have ,emerged fromrecent gains An our understanding of the comprehensionprocess and the nature Of language and language learning' Readilv Perhaps the ost important of the priorAcnowledge in reading compreheUvalon. es ablished that prior knowledge is ont, !r; influences on how well a reader comprehsdrs (4.0e4rWilson & Anderson, 1986, for examplefor a sum:lyt the xesear h in this 'area). The research on the influeoee cf pt:lor knowledge also providesa justification for the cult041 heritage argumen The more,that readersalreadyAcnow, thebetter they Will' comprehend. Several different kinds of prior knowledgeare relCvant to Amproved-comprehension: ,knowledge of content- knOwledgeof fo7 and' struptura,-And knowledge'nfgenre conventione More reading of informational texts leads toa moreextensivebackground ::.general content knowledge. Student- who know more aretbetter prepared to 'teed new material. This app1ies tp'literature,' as learn that the basic content:oUbtorieS concert:A:characters:who , , experience-a conflictor dilemmaand'thenattempt'Yto resolve,it Themore stories they -ead, themore students learn abouttheH ,form and structure of story plots. The more argumentativetexts students read, the greater_their knowledge oftechniques 0 rhetoric, of the form and structure argumentation. 'Reading particUlar:genres leads topore specificexpectations if,other texta-of the samegenre. Studentswho read mysteries, for example, soon learn that the inform= tion about thecrime is Book Reading Rabi . p esented incompletelyi andout -f order,and that thei totty to-infer and reconstruct the correct orde Oncereaders have had several encounters ith a content areai a typef text structure, or a literarygenre, they no longerJlaveo expend as much attention or effort to comprehend the featu esthey have learned. They have for ed what cog itive p ychologists call:a schema a mentalstructure representing information that ha_ alreadybeen leatned. Oile'ofthe main functions of a schema is to freeup cognitive resources for other tasks, such aL comprehending thenew information in future texts . Trade books offer opportunities for buildingrichly elaboratedschematathat-ge considerably Jleyond those offeredin most schbol books. - Bruce (1984) compared.trade books and adapted stories in basal readers on literary qualities. The basal . stories had fewe s, less character conflict, and less insight into the goals and motives ofthe characters. Many scholars of reading believe that there isan added consequence of the impoverished stories that are found in school books: They are less interesting and more difficult to understand. Students,