Reading for Pleasure
English teachers, primary school teachers have been banging
away at this old chestnut for years. Reading, we’ve been told, provides kids
with a better chance at academic
and social success. It improves vocabulary, increases knowledge base, and
makes them better at relationships. It makes them better writers and better
speakers. A magic bullet for the ills of academics.
How the heck do we get them to read? The solutions say the
experts, are easy: woo them. Bowl them over with how great reading is. Our librarian is
excellent at buying in books that interest the students. Our S1’s have a
successful reading open house. Live Lit vouchers are spent on bring in
wonderful authors like Cathy McPhail and Alan Bennet. I read as much YA fiction
as can and enthusiastically recommend to my pupils. It doesn't seem enough.
Still, I’ve had students that have announced with pride that
they have never finished a book. At our
school in S1-S3, we have silent reading for first five minutes class and we’ve
embedded it into our curriculum. My biggest problem was getting the older kids
to take it seriously –some really liked it, but a chunk of them would pick up
book one day, change the next. Too many
of them would not bring a book and would mock the ones who do. Parents sing the
same refrain: “He doesn’t read enough” and, “she used to read, but now not so
much.”
Perplexingly, despite this reluctance to read, almost all
kids love having stories read to them, and I’ve seen even the most reluctant
reader mesmerized by a story read-aloud. One of my favorite things to do with a
class, when we are tired and fed-up on a Friday, is to turn out the lights and
read a story from “Nasty
Endings” With this packed curriculum
these days, it happens too infrequently.
However, it was discussion with a parent brought another
part of the puzzle to me. Last parents’ night, I was delivering my usual spiel about
how reading was so important and how we had to make time to read. This one mum got
it: “It’s a habit. We have to create
time for it. Maybe we have to make time to read as a family. I mean I always
say I want to read and I never do because I’m busy. Maybe we have to set aside
a time as family where we all read.” And that is just it: reading needs to
become a habit.
Acquiring a habit is actually just the act of instilling
self-discipline. There are lots websites that help people instill self-discipline.
It involves making a plan and doing it over and over and over again. In some
places, it suggests that it takes at least 40-50 repetitions to create a good
habit. While this might seem like the antithesis of the suggested wooing, I
think that we don’t do our students any favours by letting them avoid silent
reading. It’s hard work becoming disciplined, but the results are worth it.
So, in my classroom, this
is what I’m doing to instill the habit in five minutes a day (+ one library
period every three weeks). I insist that they stick to one book -- a book that
they can live with for five minutes a day. I have them write in their reading
journals every day: two sentences; two minutes. A total of seven minutes. I’ll check these every few weeks to make sure
that they aren’t chopping and changing books. Those that are struggling to read
one book consistently will have intervention. I’ll involve parents if I have
to. I’ve been doing this for two months
now
Anecdotally, it’s going well. Most students are on their
second book. I’ve had a few interventions with students and have them reading
high-interest, quick reads to start with and then move on to more challenging
material. Start of class routine is embedded: Folders out, reading journals
out, books out, Read. When the time goes off at five minutes, they automatically
write the two sentences.
I’m still going to woo them. I’m going to read excerpts of
good literature. I’m going to enthusiastically
recommend books and I’m going to get them to talk about the books they are
reading. If we truly value reading for pleasure, then we have to be committed
to making it happen in our classrooms.
