Revelational Data
Data-driven decision making has become the bedrock of modern-day literacy education. We’re awash in achievement data, program data, perception data, demographic data, and more.
Early in our work at Unite for Literacy we believed it was enough to see the spark in a child’s eyes when they connected with a good book. Now we use compelling National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) data to support our thesis that having an abundance of books in the home directly correlates to the amount of time spent reading for fun.
NAEP data meets our needs for two reasons: 1) it includes samples of students from all 50 states, and 2) it asks students questions that allow us to mine information in relation to systems thinking and self-determination theory.
Hidden patterns and relationships
Answers to two of NAEP’s survey questions answered by 8th graders across the nation reveal some consistent and intriguing patterns and relationships.
Answers to the first question, “How many books do you have in your home?,” allow us to sort all 8th graders across the U.S. into four subgroups based on the percentage who answered: “0 to 10 books in the home,” “11 to 25 books in the home,” “26 to 100 books in the home,” and ”more than 100 books in the home.”
Responses by students in the first three subgroups, or 77 percent of the students, say that they have less than 100 books in their home.
Students can answer the second question, “How often do you choose to read for fun?,” in one of four ways: never or hardly ever; about once or twice a month; about once or twice a week; or every day or almost every day. Their responses help us visualize the influence that habits of reading play in improving reading outcomes among the four subgroups and gave us 16 subgroups to consider.
Clearly obvious
It’s clear that children who grow up in homes with no or very few books are not likely to read for fun.
It’s also clear that as the number of books in homes increases, the time children choose to read for fun every day increases.
Additionally, it’s clear that having 100 books in a home is a tipping point for providing the motivational support needed for choosing to read every day.
But does book abundance and choosing to read affect reading proficiency? Let’s find out.