What children in my school and
my local secondary school think
about reading and writing stories
Chenice Hadfield
aged 10
Introduction
My topic is reading and writing stories.
I enjoy reading and writing stories and
want to become a writer when I am older.
I wanted to find out what local children my
age and teenagers think about reading
and writing stories and why they have
stopped doing it if they have.
Research on reading and writing
There has been lots and lots of research
about reading and writing.
There’s too much to include here.
But I can give some examples.
Other Research ( 1 )
 Research with six year 5 classes in five London primary
school.
 Found out how if it would affect children's writing if they
read difficult stories in class.
 It was the teachers reading aloud that had most effect on
the children's writing because the children could hear
how the story sounded.
 This helped the children to write their stories because
they started to use the language that authors use and to
write different styles.
 All of the children’s writing improved.
( The Reader in the Writer available online at:
http://www.clpe.co.uk/researchandprojects/research_01.html )
Other Research ( 2 )
 It is not just reading that helps you write.
 Other things include talking about writing, drama, role
play and writing together.
(Overviews of Research on Writing. Available online at:
http://www.literacytrust.org.uk/research/writing.html )
 Objects to give children ideas, writing together and
having lots of time also help children get better at writing.
(‘An exploration of how creative writing can be improved in a Year 5 class’. Available
online at:
http://www.gtcw.org.uk/cpd/pdf/Edition%2010/Edition%2010%20%20Katy%20Blake.pdf )
 How does reading stories help
you to write stories?
 Do people prefer to write
stories at school or at home?
 Why do people prefer to write
stories at school or at home?
How I chose my sample
I wanted to collect data from
local children and teenagers
to see what they thought about
reading and writing stories.
I gave out questionnaires to Year 4 and
Year 6 in my school and Year 8 and Year
10 in a local secondary school.
Methods
 I chose to do a questionnaire because I wanted to
collect data from lots of children and teenagers.
 I wouldn’t have been able to interview that many
people and it wouldn’t have been easy for me to go
into the secondary school.
 An adult took my questionnaires into the secondary
school for me.
Data analysis
 Some of the questions on my questionnaires
are closed and some of them are open.
 I tallied the answers of the closed questions.
 I sorted the answers of the open questions by
coding them into categories.
 I didn’t know how to use a spreadsheet so I
got an adult to help me put my results into
Microsoft Excel.
 We used the spreadsheet for my pie charts
and bar charts.
Ethics (1)
I had to think carefully about not hurting other
people’s feelings.
I didn’t want people to give me their names so
they could be anonymous.
I had to promise that everything that I was told
would stay private.
I promised that I would keep the completed
sheets in a safe place so no-one would take a
look at them.
At the end of my project I’ll destroy them.
Ethics (2)
 This is what I wrote at the beginning of my
questionnaire:
Hello. My name is Chenice. I’m ten years
old and I want to find out what children
and teenagers think about reading and
writing stories. Will you help me by
completing my questionnaire please? You
do not have to. It is your choice! Any
information will not be told to anyone. It
will remain anonymous and confidential. I
will keep completed sheets in a safe place
so no-one will have a look. After the
project I will destroy the completed sheets.
Findings
How much does reading stories help
you to write stories?
Generally girls and boys as they get older
think that reading stories helps you less to
write stories.
Percentage of students
who answered the
question
How much does reading stories help you
to write stories?
100
90
80
70
60
50
40
30
20
10
0
A lot
A little bit
Not much
Not at all
Y4
Y6
Y10
Year group - GIRLS
100
Percentage of students who answered the
question
Y8
90
80
70
A lot
A little bit
Not much
Not at all
60
50
40
30
20
10
0
Y4
Y6
Y8
Year group - BOYS
Y10
How much do people like
reading stories?
 As children get older they like reading stories less.
 This is the same for boys
and girls.
 As girls get older they still
enjoy reading stories but not
as much as they did when they
were younger.
 This doesn’t happen as much with the boys.
 Boys enjoy reading stories less than girls.
How much do people like reading stories?
Percentage of students who
answered the question
100
90
80
70
A lot
A little bit
Not much
Not at all
60
50
40
30
20
10
0
Y4
Y6
Y10
Y8
Y10
Year groups - GIRLS
100
Percentage of students who answered the
question?
Y8
90
80
70
60
50
40
30
20
10
0
Y4
Y6
Year group - BOYS
How much do people like writing
stories?
 As girls and boys get older they like writing
stories less.
 In year 4 nearly everyone likes writing stories a
lot but in year 10 no-one likes writing stories a
lot.
 This is almost the same for boys and girls.
Percentage of students who answered the
question
How much do people like writing stories?
100
90
80
70
60
50
40
30
20
10
0
A lot
A little bit
Not much
Not at all
Y4
Y6
Y8
Y10
Year group - GIRLS
Percentage of students who answered the
question
100
90
80
70
A lot
A little bit
Not much
Not at all
60
50
40
30
20
10
0
Y4
Y6
Y8
Year group - BOYS
Y10
Percentage of students who answered this
question
Why people think reading stories helps you to
write stories
100
90
80
70
Y4
Y6
Y8
Y10
60
50
40
30
20
10
0
Gives you ideas
(story,
structure. style)
Increases
vocabulary
Gives different
information
Gets my
imagination
going
HOW IT HELPS
Improves my
writing (better
sentences)
Improves my
punctuation
and spelling
Why doesn’t reading stories help you
to write stories?
Not many children in my sample answered
this question.
Their answers included
 don't like writing stories
better to use your own imagination
doesn’t give me ideas
depends what story it is
it’s boring
Do you prefer to write stories at school
or at home?
Most children prefer to write stories at
school.
But the boys in year 6 say that they like
writing stories at home more than at
school.
The children in year 10 they like writing
stories at school more than at home.
Do you prefer to write stories at school or at
home?
12
Number of children
10
8
School
Home
6
4
2
0
n=13
n=13
n=6
n=10
Y4
Y6
Y8
Y10
GIRLS
12
Number of children
10
8
School
Home
6
4
2
0
n=11
n=19
n=8
n=7
Y4
Y6
Y8
Y10
Boys
Why people prefer to write stories at
home
 The 3 main reasons that
children like writing stories
at home better than
school are
 More personal
space.
 Too noisy at
school.
 More time.
 Being able to choose the
topic is important too.
Why people prefer to write stories at home
number of students
5
4
Y4 n=3
Y6 n=14
Y8 n=6
Y10 n=2
3
2
1
0
get more ideas at
home
too noisy at
school
can act it out
can concentrate
at home
more time
CATEGORIES
personal space can choose topic
can use a
computer
Why people prefer to write stories at
school
The 3 main reasons that children like
writing stories at school better than home
are
 Lots of help and everything that you
need
 Better environment (for concentrating )
 No choice!
s
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NUMBER OF STUDENTS
Why people prefer to write stories at school
8
7
6
5
4
3
Y4 n=5
Y6 n=13
Y8 n=8
Y10 n=14
2
1
0
If you have stopped writing stories at
home why did you stop?
 All of the age groups gave boring/don’t like
writing stories as the main reason.
 This increased as the students get older.
 The children in years 4 and 6 did not give
the answer too busy/other things to do but
years 8 and 10 gave it as the second most
important reason.
 In year 4 and 6 taking too long was an
important reason and in year 4 bad at
spelling was important too.
If you have stopped writing stories at home
why did you stop?
Y4 n=5
Y6 n=5
Y10 n=12
Y8 n=10
boring/don't like writing
stories
no paper at home
bad at spelling
takes too long
because started writing
stories at school
no time - lots of clubs
too hard
too busy - other things to
do
Discussion
and
Conclusion
 I got lots of questionnaires back and roughly the
same number from each year.
 But as the children got older they didn’t answer
so many questions and some of the answers
were silly.
 If I had done any interviews I would of got more
information because you would be talking to a
person not just looking at the answers on a
piece of paper.
 It would have been useful to find out more about
why as the children get older their ideas
changed. So if I did my research again I would
have done some interviews.
 The other research that I looked at said listening
to stories helped the children because they
started to use the language that authors use and
to write different styles.
 My research found that the 2 main reasons for
why the children think reading stories helps
them to write stories are it increases
vocabulary and gives them ideas
about stories and style.
 So my research agreed with the other research.
I found that one of the main reasons for
why people prefer to write stories at home
is more time.
The other research also said having lots of
time also helps children get better at
writing.
My research showed that the main reason
for why people prefer to write stories at
school was they get lots of help and
everything that they need.
The other research said that writing
together helped the children to get better
at writing stories.
I am happy about my research because I
have got answers to my research questions.
I like writing stories at school and at home for
different reasons. For example :
 I find it quieter at school because you
have no choice to be quiet.
 I like writing stories at home because you
have more time.
So I found the answers that I got interesting.