advantages of reading assignments

The Benefits of Reading for Fun

There’s a powerful academic impact, new research reveals, when students are voracious, voluntary readers.

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Mrs. Mason was “the perfect reading ambassador,” said Sandra Martin-Chang, recalling an early reading role model, her high school English and drama teacher. “She encouraged me to read excellent books with great storylines. We read The Handmaid’s Tale , and it was fabulous.… We’d envision it first and then think about how to enact it and bring it to life.”

Now a professor of education at Concordia University, Martin-Chang studies how reading storybooks and novels influences cognitive development.

In a new study published in Reading and Writing , she and her colleagues found significant differences between students who read for pleasure outside of class—immersing themselves in fantasy novels or spy thrillers, for example—and those who primarily read books to satisfy school assignments. Not only was there a powerful link between reading for fun and stronger language skills, but students who disliked reading frequently attributed their negative outlook to experiences they had in classrooms. Too much emphasis on analyzing the compositional nuts and bolts of texts and reading merely to absorb information came at a psychological cost, the researchers found, as students disengaged from voluntary reading.

In the study, Martin-Chang and her colleagues surveyed 200 university undergraduates, asking them about their reading interests, how often they read for pleasure, what motivated them, and what experiences helped shape their attitudes toward reading. They were also asked to identify authors they had read in the past—a proxy for measuring how many books they had read. The young adults then took a series of tests to gauge their reading ability.

“We found that often children’s experience in elementary school is far more positive, and then it drops in high school,” said Martin-Chang. While children in kindergarten and early elementary school tend to read storybooks as they develop their reading skills—often sharing the experience with an adult—by high school, the nature of reading changes as students are expected to read a steady diet of more challenging, information-rich texts. Somewhere during that transition, a love of reading seems to fade.

In the study, 35 percent of students pinpointed a specific reason: They didn’t enjoy reading because “being asked to analyze books in high school made it less pleasurable.”

But analyzing the elements of good writing—how persuasion works, how figurative language can elevate texts—is essential to teaching kids the full range of their expressive potential, and Martin-Chang isn’t suggesting that we read only for fun. “Competence is very, very important. We can’t skip straight to books children love without teaching them how to do it right,” she said. She likens reading to eating a well-balanced diet: “The people who say chocolate is good for you don’t recommend eating it to the exclusion of all other things.” Focusing primarily on analyzing texts and gathering information—a shift that tends to occur in middle and high school—can send the signal that reading is merely a utilitarian undertaking, robbing it of its powerful connection to human imagination, passion, and creativity, making it a lot less desirable.

We need to take reading for fun as seriously as we take academic reading, if we’re going to sustain voluntary reading through middle school and high school, and into adulthood.

Expand Their Options

For Martin-Chang, reading for pleasure isn’t a diversion from rigorous academics—it’s a gratifying form of cognitive exercise, one that is both enjoyable and intellectually beneficial.

“We don’t just want kids exercising in gym class, we want them to continue to exercise when they get home,” said Martin-Chang. “So it’s the same with reading. In school, we want to show them a range of things that hopefully they’ll pick up, go home, and continue to do on their own time.”

Even light reading provides a host of benefits, increasing verbal and creative skills, nourishing our capacity for empathy, and even reducing prejudice against stigmatized groups—all skills that are developed as readers become accustomed to inhabiting unfamiliar worlds, seeing things from new perspectives, and contemplating how a chain of events can lead to unforeseen outcomes.

Yet reading for fun—particularly the kinds of books that aren’t part of classical literature or that don’t carry literary prestige—is often considered less useful. “It’s a false dichotomy,” said Martin-Chang. “People feel like we either let the kids be creative, do what they want, and we give them choice, or we get serious about things and they excel and they’re a good student. It’s serious or it’s fun. And that dichotomy is completely misguided.”

That’s why providing students with a rich and varied reading diet can make a difference. “Offer more choice,” said Martin-Chang. Introduce students to Romeo and Juliet , but give them the option to read The Fault in Our Stars as well; let them read comic books and manga, sports writing and plays, sci-fi and horror novels. In other words, it seems clear that if we want students to build literacy skills, it’s better for them to consume dozens of texts that they love, connect with, or feel inspired by, instead of grudgingly reading one because it’s assigned.

While children’s literacy skill development begins at home, teachers play a profoundly important part in encouraging students to love reading, a point that Martin-Chang makes clear when she’s training preservice teachers.

“People will either talk about teachers that loved reading, encouraged them as readers and really lit a fire, or they’ll talk about teachers who did the exact opposite,” said Martin-Chang. “They'll talk about teachers that took something that was once pleasurable and diminished it, or they’ll talk about teachers that didn’t seem to like reading themselves, or made them feel like less of a reader.”

In the study, Martin-Chang points to research on preservice teachers showing that “over half reported receiving little to no enjoyment from reading.” The teachers often attributed their disinterest to experiences they had in school, a finding that Martin-Chang and her colleagues called “especially concerning,” alluding to the cyclical nature of reading habits. “Teachers carry immense power in influencing students’ attitudes toward reading,” the researchers concluded.

So part of Martin-Chang’s mission is to convince teachers—and everyone else—that there’s tremendous value in giving students more choice in what they read, including books that may appear to be self-indulgent or have little intellectual merit.

In the classroom, said Martin-Chang, model a love of reading—go beyond grammar and meaning and inhabit the narrative worlds on the page. Emphasize choice, and give students opportunities to read and share during class time. Teachers have shared their own strategies to promote choice: Expand your classroom library beyond the traditional literary canon, and make sure it includes books that reflect students’ backgrounds, cultures, experiences, and passions . Offer plenty of ungraded ways for them to think about their reading: To ensure that they do the reading without the pressure of grades, pair kids up as reading accountability partners ; to enliven and dramatize books, let them act out scenes ; to build a thriving community of readers, set up book clubs or book tastings . Avoid rote or mechanical exercises like reading logs , which can create the impression that reading is a chore to be completed and then quickly set aside.

And if books aren’t normally a part of your curriculum, you can still show an interest in what your students are reading by making connections to a lesson. Start a science experiment by referencing Harry Potter , for example, or use dystopian novels to discuss totalitarianism, propaganda, or human rights.

“It’s important to teach children how to read,” said Martin-Chang. “And once we do that, we need to make it worthwhile. We’ve got to give them a reason. We’ve got to give them a view once they climb that mountain.”

5 Reasons Reading is So Important for Student Success

Insights from the School of Education and Social Policy at Merrimack College

It seems so simple. Of course, students should learn to read. That’s been understood for generations. No one is going to argue against the importance of student literacy.

However, many don’t understand just  how  important student literacy and reading are to student development, starting at a very young age.  The American Pediatrics Association  reports  that reading when young – even infants being read to by their parents – increases academic success down the road.

However, many children enter kindergarten without the skills needed to read well. Helping students bridge that skills gap falls to those who have  trained to become elementary school teachers . They play a significant role in the development of young minds in this vital area.

How important?

Here are some of the ways student literacy impacts a young mind.

Self esteem.

This might be the most important area of all. The sooner students develop reading skills, the more they gain ground in the areas listed below. That leads to more assurance in how they speak and write, as well as giving them the confidence of an expanded knowledge base. When students start at an early age to read about diverse people, distant places, and historical events, they become more creative and open. Also, those who have read a lot will naturally be asked to answer more questions – another confidence builder for a young student.

Improved Concentration

An emphasis on reading and student literacy helps develop higher levels of focus and concentration. It also forces the reader to sort things out in their own mind – including topics that might not be familiar to them at all (Paris at the end of World War II, for example, or another planet in a science fiction novel). This type of concentration on one topic – rather than trying to do many things at once – leads to better focus even after the book is put down.

Critical and Analytical Thinking Skills

The classic here is when a young reader becomes absorbed with a mystery book – Hardy Boys or Nancy Drew were examples for generations of Americans – and manages to solve the mystery in her head before the books reveal it. That’s a simple example of how reading helps students develop better critical and analytical skills, something that carries over even after they have put the book down.

Stronger Memory Skills

Think about reading. Even an elementary age child with a relatively simple book must keep in mind a group of characters, the setting, and past actions. Reading helps to strengthen memory retention skills. That’s a powerful tool for young students – and older adults, as well.

Expanded Vocabulary

How many times do we all search for just the right word to express what we’re trying to say? Readers do that less. They have a larger vocabulary, and the words that young readers learn in a book will eventually make their way into their speech.

These are some of the most powerful ways that reading is important for student success. For those who have decided to teach children at the elementary school level, the impact they make on students in this vital area can resonate throughout the rest of their lives.

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