Reading Motivation In Upper Elementary Students: How Children Explain Reading For Pleasure

This qualitative study investigated the phenomenon of the pleasure reading experience in fourth and fifth grade students. The purpose of the study was to create a dialogue with children regarding their leisure reading habits in an effort to inform our understanding of aliteracy, a term that refers to having the ability to read but choosing not to. Fourth grade students were surveyed to uncover their attitudes toward pleasure reading and eleven students were chosen for interviews. Comparative data was obtained from those students who conveyed either extremely negative or extremely positive attitudes toward reading. Students of both genders were selected who had varied ability levels. Parents and fourth-grade teachers were also interviewed in an effort to triangulate data. This study revealed similarities in the way reluctant readers and motivated readers experience pleasure reading physically and intellectually and contrasts in the way these children emotionally, psychologically, and socially experience pleasure reading. Reluctant readers described preferring reality-based and experiential approaches to leisure-time activities while motivated readers described the ability to internalize stories they read for pleasure. Parental modeling did not prove to be a strong influence with this group of children and reluctant readers reported that the Accelerated Reader program provided motivation for them to read in order to meet classroom requirements