Running head: CULTIVATING A DESIRE FOR READING

Cultivating a Desire for Reading through Student Choice and Reading Time in Class
Johnny Allred
Weber State University

CULTIVATING A DESIRE FOR READING

NATURE OF THE PROBLEM

Reading teachers want their students to become lifelong readers who find pleasure in the
reading process. The ability to read is an important skill in our world, so basic reading

Commented [LM1]: I assume you include English/language arts

teachers in this. Im wondering if it would help connect this first
idea to the last sentence to say Reading and language arts
teachers

comprehension instruction is a foundational priority in the secondary classroom. Reading has

been called a prerequisite for social and cultural interaction (Clark & Rumbold, 2006). However,
once a student leaves the classroom, this reading ability wont benefit him much if he never
chooses to read again. Cultivating a desire to read should be a primary goal of a secondary
Language Arts teacher (Ediger, 2002).
Students find more joy in the reading process when they are given freedom to choose
what to read and time in the classroom to read independently (Manning et al., 2012). Further, the

Commented [LM2]: Use et al. on the first citation only if there

are six or more authors. Refer to p. 177 of APA for a nifty chart.

freedom to choose what to read helps increase a students intrinsic and extrinsic motivation for
the reading process and aids in the development of reading comprehension skills at the same
time (Krashen, 1993). Dedicated reading time in the classroom, where students read the books
they have chosen, allows students the opportunity to grapple with texts they are motivated to
read while still providing assistance from the Language Arts teacher (Miller & Anderson?,
2009).

Commented [LM3]: Im not sure language arts should be

capitalized. Usually general courses are not capitalized, just specific
course titles like Language Arts 11

With the increased focus on formative reading comprehension assessments and higher
scores on end-of-level proficiency tests, reading teachers have neither the flexibility to allow
student choice of reading material nor the time to let their students read independently in the
classroom. This time and curriculum restriction is taking the pleasure out of the reading process
for many students; because of this, an increasing number of students are graduating high school

Commented [LM4]: This sounds definitive, but you dont have

a citation. Id suggest tempering this a bit with reading teachers
may perceive that they have neither flexibility
Or you can add a citation or quote to support such a strong
statement. If it all comes from Gallagher, cite here and again at the
end.
Commented [LM5]: Really it is the lack of choice and lack of
time in class that is taking it out.

without a desire to read for leisure and personal enjoyment (Gallagher, 2009).
Literature Review

Commented [LM6]: Future APA help: You wont orphan

headings like this, but just add more spaces if necessary. No big
deal here.

CULTIVATING A DESIRE FOR READING

I.

Premise 1: Reading teachers want their students to become lifelong readers who
find pleasure in the reading process.
a. Reading for pleasure is different from reading for information.
i. Reading for information is generally motivated by obligation (work,
school, training, civic involvement, etc.).
ii. Reading for pleasure is not motivated by obligation but by pure desire, the
reader having chosen the reading activity because he or she truly wants to
read.
1. The claim could be made that a reader might truly desire to learn
information without being motivated by any obligation, but that
would make it reading for pleasure.
b. Reading teachers are responsible for training their students regarding several
reading comprehension measures.
i. Vocabulary development (decoding).
ii. Fluency (speed and accuracy).
iii. Elements of literature (Plot, theme, setting, style, etc.).
c. One primary responsibility of a reading teacher is to cultivate a desire to read
independently and voluntarily (Ediger, 2002).
i. Reading is a prerequisite to becoming an active and informed citizen
(Clark & Rumbold, 2006).
Students enjoy reading more when they are given freedom of choice in reading material

and class time for independent reading. Pleasure from reading can be a difficult thing to measure,
so most research in this area has connected reading enjoyment with student motivation (Von

CULTIVATING A DESIRE FOR READING

Sprecken, Kim, &and Krashen, 2000), engagement (Servilio, 2009), and an increase in reading

Commented [LM7]: More APA minutiae: If you have a citation

in parentheses, you use the &. If it is in text you use and.

comprehension (Krashen, 2004; Allan, Ellis, & and Pearson, 2005). Most studies regarding

Commented [LM8]: APA: When you have more than one

citation in a parenthesis, put them in alphabetical order.

reading enjoyment have investigated general student opinions about reading and how these
factors (choice and class reading time) impact overall feelings towards reading.

Commented [LM9]: This is a great paragraph, summarizing the

research and the issues.

When students are given the ability to choose what they read, their motivation to read has
increased, both intrinsically and extrinsically. Krashen (1993) discovered that, when students
chose what they read and were given an informal environment in which to read, they exhibited
more motivation, they read more and for longer periods of time, and they displayed greater
increases in reading literacy. In addition, teachers have been shown to enjoy providing choice in

Commented [LM10]: Greater than who? I assume there is a

comparison group so finish out the thought and add, when
compared to a control group that did not have choice or whatever
is true for the study.

class readings because they feel that it increases student motivation and effort (Schraw,
Flowerday, &and Lehman, 2000). Studies consistently show that choice is an important factor in
reading motivation.
In addition to an increase in student motivation, the ability to choose what to read results
in greater student engagement during class activities. Servilio (2009) conducted a case study
aimed at answering whether reading teachers could improve student engagement and increase
reading grades through student choice (2009). The study involved a class of 24 fifth-grade
students, with six students classified identified as special educationreceiving services from
special education. The school was in a low-income area. Working with the schools special
education teacher, the researcher created a reading unit that gave students freedom to choose
their text. Common assessments were created that guided the readings, asking about characters,
events, conflicts, etc. from the chosen novel. The researcher created rubrics and final evaluations,
both oral and written, that were designed to show how engaged the students were throughout the
process. Engagement during class time was also observed, including time on-task and number of

Commented [LM11]: If you say studies or research at the

beginning you have to cite something.

CULTIVATING A DESIRE FOR READING

disruptions, while students were reading and discussing their books. Results of the study showed
an increase in reading enjoyment. Students were more eager to begin reading and to create
unique projects that showed their learning. The increase in time on-task and the decrease in

Commented [LM12]: Was there a comparison group? Or were

the students observed before and after? It isnt clear from what is
written here.

disruptions were both statistically significant, reading enjoyment increased, and the researcher
recommended that teachers use student choice when creating reading units (Servilio, 2009).
When students are more engaged and interested in reading, they also develop greater reading
comprehension. Therefore, if choice and in-class reading result in increased engagement, it
would follow that they also result in greater reading comprehension. These notions were put to
the test by Krashen (1993), who concluded that students who read for pleasure end up getting
hooked on books (p. 85), and those students acquire several traits related to reading
comprehension: a large vocabulary, improved spelling proficiency, the ability to use complex
grammatical concepts, and an overall acceptable level of literacy (Krashen, 1993). Another study
was conducted to test the hypothesis that an increase in time spent reading resulted in an increase
in reading ability (Taylor, Frye, and Maruyama, 1990). The participants were 195 students in
fifth and sixth grade in a suburban school district. Students were asked to complete reading logs
for each day of class. Research assistants read through the logs weekly and recorded entries. The
logs included information about how much time students spent reading and how many pages
they read. At the end of the study, a reading comprehension test was administered to each
student. A multiple regression analysis was performed using the comprehension scores. The
results of the study confirmed the hypothesis an increase in time spent reading a book the student
has chosen results in greater reading comprehension. This didnt apply to reading at home,
however; there was no significant increase in reading comprehension when reading at home
increased (Taylor et al., 1990). The limitation of this study is that the increase of reading

Commented [LM13]: This is a nice transition that takes the

benefits of reading engagement deeper than just enjoyment.

CULTIVATING A DESIRE FOR READING

comprehension occurred simply due to more time reading, not necessarily because students were
given freedom to choose.

Commented [LM14]: Good clarification for understanding the

relationship of the research.

The results presented by Taylor et al. (1990) imply that the teacher has an important role
in the reading process: students become better readers more quickly with support from a reading
teacher. Students who truly enjoy reading will read outside of school, without teacher support;
students who dont naturally enjoy reading benefit much more with the framework of a freereading unit guided and directed by a reading teacher. This notion was tested through the
creation of a year-long, teacher-directed, free-reading routine in a sixth-grade classroom in the
southern United States (Miller & Anderson, 2009). The researcher, an experienced reading
teacher, conducted a study to test whether dedicated, consistent, year-long reading time in class
increased students motivation to read. The researchers also wanted to learn how teachers can
help students develop a love for reading while still challenging them through difficult texts. In
this study, the teacher built an extensive classroom library of young adult literature, used
questionnaires to survey existing reading preferences, and put a book in front of each student
based on his reading interests. Students were required to read a book and complete a journal
entry each day, participate in regular reading conferences with the teacher, and report on all
readings by the end of the year. In this study, the teacher was a central and integral part of the

Commented [LM15]: Are you still reporting on Miller and

Anderson? It might be helpful to repeat that so it is clear.

reading process. If a student didnt like the book she was reading, the teacher would guide her to
another book, until she found something that interested her. The teacher also aligned reading
instruction with concepts that students were struggling with or needed practice observing in text.
According to the teacher, no student has ever failed to read the required 40 books per school
year. On end-of-level tests, the students in the class consistently score above average for the
school district and state for reading comprehension (Miller & Anderson, 2009). Although this

Commented [LM16]: Not sure what this means.

CULTIVATING A DESIRE FOR READING

free-reading unit would be difficult to implement for all teachers, the results show that students
reading comprehension levels increase significantly with dedicated in-class reading time and the
support of a reading teacher throughout the process.
Instead of complete choice, where every student in a classroom might be reading a
different book, there is much research regarding the practice of literature circles, where students
are put into small groups of four or five and they select a group book to focus on. These smaller
reading groups still allows for student choice, but it provides an additional sphere of support:
students helping students through the reading of specific books. The effectiveness of literature
circles was tested by Allan, Ellis, and Pearson (2005) who investigated. These researchers were
investigating how to set up literature circles in a classroom, whether student opinions toward

Commented [LM17]: I wonder if there is a meta-analysis about

literature circles. It would be good to look for that (for the future)
and look at it by grade level.

reading affected the productivity of literature circles, and if gender had an impact on opinions of
reading. Four different classes were included in this study: four primary classes and one
secondary class in Scotland. The study included a mix of quantitative and qualitative measures.
Teachers in these classes kept journals of their reading instruction, and they met regularly with
each other to discuss their experiences. Researchers conducted interviews with students and
teachers to determine the effectiveness of literature circles and the benefits of peer and teacher
support. Vocabulary knowledge was assessed at the beginning and again at the end of the
project. Students responded to a questionnaire regarding their feelings about reading in and out
of school. The results showed significant improvement in standardized vocabulary scores after
the literature circle unit. There was also significant improvement in positive feelings about
reading and in total time spent reading inside and outside of school (Allan et al., 2005). These
findings show that literature circles can be an effective way to improve the desire to reading, the
ability to comprehend what is read, and the overall opinions regarding reading.

Commented [LM18]: I like that you have a summary at the

beginning of your paragraphs, followed by details of the study, and
an interpretation at the end. Great structure for synthesizing the
research.
Add a summary here before transitioning to the problem. You want
to tie up this section, emphasizing the important points.

CULTIVATING A DESIRE FOR READING

II.

(Detailed above)

III.

With the increased focus on formative reading comprehension assessments and

higher scores on end-of-level proficiency tests, reading teachers have neither the
flexibility to allow student the choice of reading material nor the time to let their
students read independently in the classroom.
a. These restrictions are taking the pleasure out of the reading process for many
students (Gallagher, 2009).
i. Therefore, an increasing number of students are graduating high school
without a desire to read for leisure and personal enjoyment (Gallagher,
2009).

CULTIVATING A DESIRE FOR READING

REFERENCESeferences
Allan, J., Ellis, S., & Pearson, C. (2005). Literature circles, gender and reading for enjoyment.

Commented [LM19]: Be sure to add the doi for each, where

available.
Commented [LM20]: Missing info for APA

Clark, C., & Rumbold, K. (2006). Reading for pleasure: A research overview. National Literacy
Trust.
Ediger, M. (2002). Reading for enjoyment and pleasure. ERIC Processing and Reference
Facility.
Gallagher, K. (2009). Readicide: How schools are killing reading and what you can do about it.
Portland, Maine: Stenhouse Publishers.
Krashen, S. (1993). The power of reading. Englewood, Colorado: Libraries Unlimited, Inc.
Krashen, S. (2004). The case for narrow reading. Language Magazine, 3(5), 17-19.
Manning, C., Aliefendic, J., Chiarelli, M., Haas, L., & Williams, S. (2012). Inspirational
impetuous: Lifelong learning. SRATE Journal, 21(1), 11-17.
Miller, D., & Anderson, J. (2009). The book whisperer: Awakening the inner reader in every
child. San Francisco, Calif: Jossey-Bass.
Servilio, K. L. (2009). You get to choose! Motivating students to read through differentiated
instruction. Teaching Exceptional Children Plus, 5(5), 1-11.
Schraw, G., Flowerday, T., & Lehman, S. (2001). Increasing situational interest in the
classroom. Educational Psychology Review, 13(3), 211-224.
Taylor, B., Frye, B., & Maruyama, G. (1990). Time spent reading and reading growth. American
Educational Research Journal, 27(2), 351-362. doi: 10.3102/00028312027002351.
Von Sprecken, D., Kim, J., & Krashen, S. (2000). The home run book: Can one positive reading
experience create a reader? California School Library Journal, 23(2), 8-9.

Commented [LM21]: Was this a report? Or book? It seems

there is missing info here.