The reading workshop is not based on ability groups, but provides a venue to focus on each student's strengths and needs. Components include a teacher-sharing time, focus lesson, state-of-the-class conference, self-selected reading and responding time, and student-sharing time. (MLH)

Compares second grade and fifth grade students' recreational reading levels (when students self-select library books for recreation reading) in relation to independent, instructional, and frustration levels as determined with an informal reading inventory. Concludes that recreational reading levels should not be viewed as synonymous with…

To determine whether children find paperback books more appealing than hardbound books, children's reactions to paperback books were compared with their reactions to the same titles in hardbound format. A total of 150 fifth graders were divided into two groups: 78 children (42 boys and 36 girls) examined 30 hardbound books, and 72 children (38…

A study was conducted to compare students' recreational reading levels to their independent, instructional, and frustrational levels determinable with an informal reading inventory. Subjects, 20 second grade and 20 fifth grade students, were administered the Basic Reading Inventory. In addition, the school's librarian recorded titles of four books…

Eighty-one fifth grade students from a suburban parochial school were randomly assigned to one of two treatment groups in a study designed to determine the effect of daily sustained silent reading (SSR) on student reading habits and attitudes toward reading. One teacher supervised 40 students in daily fifteen-minute periods of SSR, using…

Investigates the relationship of out-of-school activities to reading achievement. Finds a wide variation between children in amount of out-of-school reading. Concludes that reading books was the out-of-school activity that had the strongest association with reading proficiency, but that on most days most subjects did little or no book reading. (MM)

A study in two South African schools investigated the impact of encouraging free, voluntary reading on the English language skills of English-as-a-Second-Language (ESL) learners. Subjects were 139 fourth- through seventh-grade students in an experimental group and 105 students in a control group. Pretests of reading comprehension were administered…

The content of books chosen independently by fourth, fifth, and sixth, graders was compared with the content of four selected basal reading texts at the same three grade levels. The selections of the children and from the texts were classified into twenty-one categories, and then the percentages of the children's choices within these categories…