What Should “Count” For Summer Reading?

This blog series was inspired by a 12 year-old who wanted to know why the approximately 10,000 pages of manga he read over the summer did not “count” as much as other books (e.g. Newbery and other award winning books) for his school summer reading log. Over the next few weeks, several literacy scholars, parents, librarians - some who wear some or all of these hats and several not mentioned - share their response to what "should" count. 

Introduction

Fifty-four million kids will be returning to school - millions have already - and millions will be turning in summer reading logs. Having students read during the summer is intended to decrease the well documented “summer slide” in which students regress in their learning progress from the previous school year, requiring teachers to spend a significant amount of time reteaching material at the beginning of the school year that was presumably taught at the end of the previous school year. The impact of the summer slide is even more pronounced for children coming from homes and communities with fewer economic resources. Anderson, Wilson, and Fielding’s (1986) often cited study on the reading habits of fifth-graders outside of school found that “the child who is at the 90th percentile in amount of book reading spends nearly five times as many minutes per day reading books as the child at the 50th percentile, and over two hundred times as many minutes per day reading books as the child at the 10th percentile” (p. 297). In other words, “the median child reads about 650,000 words a year outside of school, whereas avid readers read as much as 5,850,000 words a year” (p. 240). The researchers state that their most important finding was, “time spent reading books was the best predictor of a child's growth as a reader from the second to the fifth grade” (p. 298). Their results were similar to prior studies (e.g. Greaney, 1980; Walberg & Tsai, 1984) and recent studies that continue to show that the amount of time students read inside and outside of school has a significant impact on their reading achievement. 

At the time of Anderson et al.’s study, traditional printed books were measured and most closely connected with “reading” outside of school. These days, kids are reading across many forms from traditional printed books to ebooks on various screens (e.g cell phones, tablets, ipads). If you really want to ruffle feathers, ask whether audiobooks “count” as reading, as one person did on goodreads and received 178 responses ranging from “yes, it totally is” to “audiobooks are listening” but the responder also asks, “Do you say you read a book if someone read it aloud to you?” We’ll skip the audiobook question for this blog. However, equally contentious is the question of whether graphic novels count as “real reading” (Scholastic, 2024) to which authors of the article offer three reasons why children should be encouraged to read graphic novels: (1) Graphic novels are full of text, (2) Graphic novels are engaging; and (3) Graphic novels are high-quality reading material. 

Perhaps, rather than asking what should “count” for summer reading, we should be asking why we want our students reading, toward what ends, and for what purpose? We will assume all teachers, parents, and adults want children to be highly literate (we’ll save a discussion of what counts as “literate” for another blog), curious, confident, critically conscious citizens, and powerful world-changers and we know literacy plays an essential role. 

We will be sharing various perspectives over the next few weeks as to “What should ‘count’ for summer reading?” and hope you and the young people in your lives find meaning, joy, and purpose in whatever you and they choose to read!     

References

Anderson, R., Wilson, P. & Fielding, L. (1988). Growth in reading and how children spend their time outside of school. Reading Research Quarterly, 23(3), 285-303. 

goodreads (2018). Polls for Our Souls. Retrieved on August 14, 2024 from https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/19610546-do-you-consider-audio-books-reading 

Greaney, V., & Hegarty, M. (1984). Correlates of leisure time reading. Unpublished manuscript, Educational Research Centre, St. Patrick’s College, Dublin. 

Nagy, W., Anderson, R., & Herman, P. (1987). Learning word meanings from context during normal reading. American Educational Research Journal, 24(2), 237 - 270. 

Scholastic (August 7, 2024). 3 ways graphic novels benefit reading skills. Retrieved on August 14, 2024 from https://www.scholastic.com/parents/books-and-reading/raise-a-reader-blog/3-reasons-graphic-novels-can-be-great-young-readers.html#:~:text=There%20are%20some%20myths%20about,literacy%20experts%20disagree%20with%20this. 

Walberg, H.J., & Tsai, S. (1984). Reading achievement and diminishing returns to time. Journal of Educational Psychology, 76, 442-451.