Offers 10 strategies to enhance reading skills through wildlife reference books and other literature. Lists 10 nonfiction and 33 fiction references as resources for initiating a positive relationship among children, wildlife, and reading. (MG)

Explores how eighth-grade students choose books for recreational reading. Identifies and analyzes strategies used during a book selection process and information valued during the experiences. Describes how accurately and thoughtfully many students can predict whether they would like to read a particular book or not. Demonstrates the complexities…

Presents a project where the teacher, rather than teaching the students how to read using a remedial, isolated skills approach, concerned herself with getting them to read by "falling into the literature" and getting involved in the characters' lives. Describes a reader response approach that was designed to motivate the students to engage with…

The readers' advisory service was a product of social forces operating in the context of early twentieth century capitalism. The work of French regulation theorists provides a framework for analyzing these forces using the concepts of regime of accumulation and mode of regulation. Libraries were connected in a society-wide project, as opposed to…

For the past one hundred years, the American public has been entertained by the daily and the Sunday newspaper comic strips. The comics are now recognized as a legitimate and unique pop art form that chronicles the American culture. Research concerning reading interests and preferences provide evidence that the comics have a particular attraction…

Elementary Teachers today are under enormous pressure to teach children to read better. Teachers sometimes lose sight of the fact that if we can inspire children to want to learn, to want to read more about a topic, everyone wins--even the people whose sole interest is reading test scores. In the social studies, we want students to be thirsty for…

What are adolescents choosing to read? This is an important question because of potential divergence between school students' reading interests and reading expectations in school. This article considers the findings from a study of the reading over one week in May 2002 of 707 school students aged between 11 and 15, undertaken in 30 schools in the…

A study examined the commonalities that "voracious" readers share, and how their experiences can guide parents, teachers, and librarians in assisting children to become self-actualized readers. Subjects, 25 adults ranging in age from 20 to 67 years, completed a questionnaire concerning their reading histories and habits. Respondents…

The Joker's Wild Game is a form of evaluation that is enjoyable and also allows for student participation. (JH)

The great majority of the Founding Fathers were readers. In fact, the leading political figures of late eighteenth-century America were generally, and often intimately, acquainted with the output of the greatest European minds of the day--and of the minds of the ancient western world. Two factors above all placed an ineffaceable stamp on the…

The reading interests of children should be considered by teachers in order to increase positive attitudes toward reading, the amount of their reading, and their reading achievement. Since findings show that using trade books to teach reading has strong positive effects upon children's reading achievement, a study examined children's choices of…

The newsletter for parents of handicapped children focuses on summer activities which provide fun and learning without undue expense or effort. Suggestions include encouraging reading activities (including visiting the library, reading out loud, selective television viewing, making a book, and writing letters). Activities to encourage the child's…

A study employed a uses and gratifications approach to determine why people in different demographic groups read supermarket tabloids. One hundred thirty-three readers of the "National Enquirer," the "Star," or the "Globe" returned mail questionnaires distributed in three different demographic locations. The…

Research in visual communication suggests that relatively complex graphics stimulate viewer interest, while relatively simple graphics facilitate learning. A study was conducted to determine whether the graphics in two science publications ("Scientific American" and "Sciences 81") would be tailored to the ways in which their…

A teacher expressed his views on the importance of helping students realize the beauty of good reading. (RK)