Year 12 A level English Language Key Stage 3 Reading/Writing Research Project

But getting children interested in reading at a young age is seen as key to raising their educational development. Teachers ideally aim to install a sense of interest and encourage wider reading habits in school children, particularly those who might be feeling bored by what they do in the classroom. However, even a teacher's enthusiasm or the efforts to create a reading environment in school libraries won't necessarily be enough to bring the element of reading for pleasure to life amongst some pupils. Suggestions on how to do this included:

• Certificates for reading
• Teachers using pupil recommendations
• Reading buddies — matching up different groups for reading sessions
• Newspaper reading
• Use of whole books and not extracts
• School librarians in primary and secondary schools
• Keeping up to date with new children's literature

I want to see if any of these suggestions are used and if students find them effective.

Observation: I sat in on a year 9 class whilst the students were reading in groups and then reporting back to the class.  The main things I found out were:

• Boys tended to be reading fantasy, comedy or horror
• Girls were mostly reading teen drama and horror
• Boys were more easily distracted
• Girls tended to report back in more detail and more in depth
• Boys reports were more humorous and less accurate

Transcript: I recorded a conversation I had with a year 9 student about their reading.  The transcript helped me to see what this individual felt about the reading habits and what could encourage them to read more.

Questionnaire: I compiled a questionnaire to hand out to students to find out about their reading habits. In my pilot study, I realised I had to modify some of the vocabulary as the participants did not understand a few sentences.  I handed my final questionnaire out to 30 students in a Year 9 class.  I found that the majority of students who enjoyed reading were girls.  Most children read at school the most and out of school, it was mainly for a period of 1-2 hours a week.  Magazines were the most popular type of text. Teachers encouraged students to read more. Comedy was the most popular genre of both sexes.

Detailed Questionnaire: I also handed out a detail questionnaire to ten students focusing on why they choose their books, what encourages them to read and why, relating to the research I found by the national curriculum.  I found from this that with boys, horror and fantasy were the most popular genre because they were found to be more interesting, exciting and creative. With girls, teen drama was preferred as it was seen as being more realistic. All round Comedy was most popular with both sexes. Those who said they did not enjoy reading said it was mainly because it was boring. More boys (3) said this than girls. All of the ten students had participated in group reading and 8/10 found it more fun and felt that it helped them to understand what they were reading better.  When asked what would encourage them to read more, many said if there were more exciting books and if reading wasn’t forced on them at school.  The most important things when choosing a book generally were the blurb and friends opinions. 7/10 said they would like to be rewarded with book vouchers for reading.

Conclusion: From conducting my research, I have proved my hypotheses that girls read more and enjoy reading more.  My predictions of what genre would be preferred was correct although comedy was popular among boys and girls.  My detailed questionnaire helped me to find the reasons why. The questionnaires gave me a general, broad idea whereas my transcript helped me to get a personal and detailed point of view.