In response to not meeting No Child Left Behind’s adequate yearly progress benchmark last year, Prairie Ridge High School needed to develop a plan to address deficiencies in students’ academic skills. The Reading Minute is part of this plan and encourages pleasure reading, a life-long skill essential for success in the future.
In order to design a solution, a group of teachers and PR principal, Mr. Humpa, met several Monday mornings during CLT time to discuss and research ideas. Mrs. Kautz, who teaches English and Reading, explained that she and the others involved “felt like [students] needed to read across the curriculum” in classes such as science, math, and social studies. However, since each curriculum is extremely busy, they believed that “if we introduced the idea of Reading Minute, it would be less intimidating and wouldn’t take so much time out of the classes.”
Students often use the last few minutes of class as time to socialize with their friends, play games on their iPods, or simply line up at the door and stare at the clock in boredom, waiting for the bell to dismiss them. Why not use this time to read something for fun? Finding natural free moments to read during a day is how the Reading Minute works.
The entire purpose of Reading Minute is to encourage PR students to develop the daily habit of reading. Though studies show that teenagers generally do not choose to read during their free time, educational research demonstrates that giving students time to read in class, thus starting a daily habit of reading, results in numerous positive outcomes such as a higher vocabulary level, higher standardized test scores, and a faster reading rate.
Mrs. Bland explained that becoming a better, faster reader is something all students should want. The improvement of standardized test scores based on reading is “really important right now because of the ACT and college admissions,” and the faster reading rate is necessary since “college courses require a lot more reading than in high school.”
Besides academics, there are social benefits to developing a reading habit. “When you read, you meet new characters, and you see other life situations that you would have never otherwise experienced,” Mrs. Kautz said. “So, because you’ve read about these things, like someone suffering from a disease or a death in their family, you become a more empathetic person. When you meet someone in life who has had the same experience of the character, you’re more aware.”
As of right now, the Reading Minute is only at its beginning stages. Mrs. Bland and Mrs. Kautz presented the idea to the faculty before spring break. They requested that teachers introduce the Reading Minute to their classes and expect students to always have an independent reading book to carry from class to class. They hope that teachers and students will often discuss their favorite books with each other.
Ultimately, the plan will only work if students read more every day. “How can you get better at something if you never practice?” Mrs. Bland asked.
