Sunday, March 8, 2015

Is AR Killing the Love of Reading?

Over the past year, I have really taken it upon myself to immerse myself in the world of children's literature.  I believe that in order to be the best reading teacher, I must know what's available and be able to make personal recommendations to my young readers.

I have come to this conclusion by learning from people like Donalyn Miller (The Book Whisperer), blogs like Nerdy Book Club, conferences like All Write, and through various chats on Twitter.

We all know that to become a good reader, children must read.  A lot.  Like, really, really a lot.  Look at the top readers in your classroom.  What do they do?  They read a lot.  Now look at your lowest readers.  What aren't they doing?  Reading.

Our goal as teachers should be to teach our students to become passionate about their reading lives, to be so excited about a book that they just can't help but talk about it in hopes of getting others to love it as much.  That's what I do as a reader.  As soon as I finish a book, I have the perfect student reader in mind for it.  The next day, I go into class, find that student, and say, "Have I got a book for you!"

In my school district, like many school districts, Accelerated Reader is a program we use to monitor students' reading.  In case you aren't familiar with AR, students read a book in their assigned level then take a quiz on the book to test their comprehension.  Each book is assigned a point level and when students finish a quiz, they earn points.  Their goal is to earn a certain number of points each quarter.

At first, I loved AR.  It was a way that I could do a quick check of my student's reading ability and the amount of reading they did.

However, now I feel this love affair is ending.

After taking on this mission to immerse myself in children's lit, I am beginning to see the shortcomings of programs like AR.

My students are looking at books for the point value they offer, not for the ideas and stories they contain inside.  Let me say that again -- students are equating books with points, not with the love of reading.

The quizzes that students take after finishing a book are very surface level.  After taking enough of these quizzes, my students have figured out what they need to remember about a book in order to pass the quiz.  There is no deeper level thinking required by the quiz.

Many of the newer titles that get released take awhile to make their way into the AR quiz system.  I have actually been told by students that they couldn't read a book I was recommending because there wasn't a quiz they could take at the end.

Really?

All of my thinking came to a blowing point this past week when one of my students revealed to me in a reading conference that he felt like he needed to abandon a book.  This is one of my students who has worked so hard to improve as a reader and has made amazing gains.

I asked him why he wanted to abandon his book.  Wasn't he enjoying it?

He said he loved the book, but he was worried that he wouldn't pass the AR quiz.  You see, the book was slightly above his level and he was concerned that he wouldn't remember the minute details that the quiz would surely ask.

I asked him if he would keep reading the book if I didn't require him to take the quiz.

"Really?" he asked.  "I can do that?"  His eyebrows shot up and a smile spread across his face.

Yes, you can.

I want my students to become lifelong readers.  Readers who are excited about reading.  Who take chances and try new things in their reading.  I make lots of books available in my classroom, and I want my students to feel like they can read any one of them just "because."

After all, how many of us book lovers take a quiz when we finish a book?

17 comments:

  1. AMEN! I feel the same way about Reading Counts in Read 180. Once we hit 2.5 million words, I am giving them permission to read whatever they want. My one criteria is that I have approval - just to make sure they are reading a challenging enough text. In Read 180 they have QuickWrites and Graphic Organizers to do before the quiz, but I figure that they can do a Book Recommendation form, and pick a project to do to show me they really got the book. Readers should read for the love of it, not the points or words counted! I am right there with you!

    Hope your weather has not been unbearable! Been thinking about you!

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    1. You can create your own quizzes for Read180 so that students can get points for books that are not from the Read180 Library.

      Brynn Allison
      The Literary Maven

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    2. Thanks Brynn, I do it frequently for them. We have access to a huge number of quizzes. It is just that sometimes they really want to read something, and I don't have time to read it and make a quiz for it. I am just going to let them read and not worry if what they are reading is "quizzable" or not:).

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  2. Congratulations! I dropped my self-devised Reading Logs and everything else. Suddenly the whole reading period was about nothing but--reading. Talking with me or hearing them talk with others showed me they were definitely growing with their choices. It was a whole new world after that. Freedom!

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  3. This is a debate I have long had with AR. Our school librarian fought labeling the books for AR and that got her a lot of criticism from some. Her point was students choosing a book off of points instead of interest and simply the love of a book. Your note about the student reading just above his level but in Vygotsky's Zone rang true. I enjoyed your thoughts and observations.

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  4. Thanks for sharing this post. I have had a love/hate relationship, too, with AR. I don't like the quizzes...however, since my school did spend $$$ on it for quizzes on all books, I do use it. I focus on the word count, though. MOST of my students enjoy that. Our goal, as a 4th grader, is to read 500,000 words. I have 4 that have hit 2 million already. Some kids need a little competition, I think. I keep the required amount of points low, only 15 per quarter. Most can meet that no problem. We check our word count every Monday. My class has the highest amount of words read in our grade level. Would they still read without AR? Yes, since we do book talks and share books with one another, book clubs, lunchtime book clubs, as well as reading time every day in class. I think it's important to do all of those things, but AR can be another tool to use. I don't require my kids to keep a daily reading log, but they do keep a log of all the books they read. If they forget to jot it down, AR can give them their list, so I do like that aspect. Also, if the book they read was not on AR, they can write me a half page summary and I give them points and words. That only happens once in a while. Just my two cents. :-)

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    1. I like your word count compromise, and I completely relate to your dilemma. I have found a way to make AR a part of my classroom while still focusing on a love of literature and a daily minimum in- class self-selected reading time of 45 minutes. I use Donalyn Miller's "Books I've Read" and "Books I Want to Read" sheets along with the Two Sisters' CAFE strategies and AR. My students read more books than any other class in our school, and they're comfortable rereading books they love in spite of the fact that they can't retake an AR test. They talk about books to each other, form their own book clubs, and bring in pictures of themselves "Reading in the Wild". For me, AR is not evil.

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  5. I tend to agree with you. What I've gone to for my seventh graders is a book goal system where each student needs to read three books per quarter - but books over 250 pages count as two books, and books over 500 pages count as three. They all have a very manageable fifteen point goal, and we work to undo what happened in sixth grade - reading picture books for points or books worth a lot of points that they don't enjoy. I can't completely abandon AR, but I can make it work for us.

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  6. As a 6th Lit teacher, I can agree with you! My students are from impoverished families and few have parents encouraging/reminding them to read at home. I have dropped the required points, dropped the AR reading level boundaries, and simply asked students to read and then (since we have a school-wide competition for AR points among 6th, 7th, and 8th grades) I encourage them to take the AR tests.

    Thank you for voicing your thoughts. And thank you to those above who commented. I appreciate hearing the thoughts of others.

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  7. As a 6th Lit teacher, I can agree with you! My students are from impoverished families and few have parents encouraging/reminding them to read at home. I have dropped the required points, dropped the AR reading level boundaries, and simply asked students to read and then (since we have a school-wide competition for AR points among 6th, 7th, and 8th grades) I encourage them to take the AR tests.

    Thank you for voicing your thoughts. And thank you to those above who commented. I appreciate hearing the thoughts of others.

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  9. I can see both sides of this. I was brought up reading and love to read. When I started teaching, I found it crazy that so many of my students hated reading. In school thats was my escape! My students come from a poor area and their lives are very different from mine growing up, most do not have the foundation for reading that I had. This year has by far been my most difficult year (I have only been teaching four years) and this class has told me they hate to read! HATE…so many of them said that until we started novel studies. My class is below grade level in every aspect, but doing novel studies has sparked a love of reading in some. We have a limited license in AR and my grade level started using AR just over a month ago because we were at a loss as to what to do with our students. For some of my kids they have found it motivating to read at home. Others, have found it filled with pressure. I can see down the road the love/hate relationship building… but for now I will take anything that gets this class to read

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  10. I don't like any attempt to quantify such a subjective skill. We have older students who skim books and then take 10 AR tests in a day trying to just get some points. I teach Kinder and our librarian lectured me the other day about how my students' points should be higher. They know how to do it, they know they can do it-but it's not a requirement for me. I know exactly where they are in their reading without those scores.

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  11. I am right there with you! I like that I can see what they are reading, but that's about it. Our librarian really pushes it which turns my middle school kids off of taking them. I know they read, I see them read, I hear them read, I read with them, and that's enough for me. I no longer give them a grade for points because kids who read got the points, and the others weren't motivated at all by the grade. Now we just have "point clubs" that kids can reach. I'm more interested in my kids reading quality books that they enjoy than reading a lot of really awful books just to get points.

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  12. I think it's amazing (and not in a good way) how this testing/documenting everything mindset has made its way down to kids already.

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  13. Jennifer,

    Does AR have a feature for you to create and add your own quizzes? If not, could you create your own paper version and add that into students' point totals?

    Brynn Allison
    The Literary Maven

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  14. We don't really have AR at the school I presently teach in - we have the similar Reading Counts which is mainly used for the intensive reading classes. We are required to have the students complete a book project each month and getting them to read is like trying to walk uphill in 10 feet of snow! So I am open to anything that they will see as making reading fun but I am pretty sure quizzes wouldn't do the trick.

    -Lisa
    Mrs. Spangler in the Middle

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