Hodgson Academy Reading School: The Book Club Project

As part of Hodgson Academy's passion to become a 'Reading School,' where reading for learning is an exciting focus, we are proud to share what our Reading Club Project has achieved this year in terms of raising reading ages by up to three years! What makes this even more exciting is the fact that this is not purely an English Department event but is being led by one of our colleagues from the Science Department. Our Reading Club Project is led by Joanne Hutchinson who has shared her findings.

 

Introduction
Through the introduction of testing our students for their reading ages and spelling ages into our standard year 7 testing routine, it was apparent that many students entered their high school education with a lower than average reading and spelling age.

We thought it would be a great idea if the existing Peer Mentors that the Head of English had trained for one to one mentoring might be able to assist these students by becoming their Reading Mentors.

The impact of this intervention could then be measured by using the reading and spelling ages from year 7 as a baseline and then testing them again after the intervention to determine if there was a significant increase.

Method

Some students were selected by the learning support team due to lower than average WRAT tests and the some were identified by their reading age information. All students in year 8 that had reading ages of 9 years or under were invited to participate.

In form period on Mondays, the students meet with their mentor and read a number of pages from their allocated book, out loud with their Reading Mentor. The mentor offers guidance on pronunciation and understanding of any words that the mentee struggles with.

A record is kept of the number of pages completed in the session and allows comments to be recorded. Students’ comments can be about the experience, or about particular words or mentor comments on how the mentee had performed.

Results from last year show promise!

Of the students retested 6 months later, the following results were found

Reading Age Analysis		Spelling Age Analysis
%	Change	%	Change
82% Tested	Increased by 1 year	71% Tested	Increased by 1 year
57%	Increase 2 years or more	29%	Increase 2 years or more
18%	Increase 3 years	7%	Increase 3 years or more

Conclusion

As expected most students; 82% had increased their reading age by 1 year.

57% demonstrated an increase of 2 years or more


18% increased their reading age by 3 years







In conclusion, a number of factors will have affected the reading ages and literacy progress of the high school students tested including external factors and the daily study within the school day. The project aimed to give students understanding and improve their reading age.

The results above suggest that this was successful and the project is worth continuing in the future. This could have been as a direct result of the intervention or could have been more indirectly affected by the assessment and process of the reading club project. The students may have read more due to being part of the project or may have had more parental involvement in their outside reading. We are delighted and encouraged by these results and have already set up the club for this term!