PROFESSIONAL LEARNING TEAM REPORT
2011-2012
PLT Title
Building Reading Motivation in Kindergarten
Blurb for PLT Conference Brochure
We focused on improving student reading motivation and excitement in our kindergarten students.
Using a reading interest inventory, we determined that students were not feeling excited about
reading compared to their many other interests. We developed a list of books, lessons and activities in
order to improve student motivation in reading. We reassessed students at the end of the year and
were able to have some success in improving students reading attitudes.
Contact Information (Write * next to facilitator’s name.)
Name
School
Kelly Winn Hiltz*
Winn Brook
Melanie Hannon
Winn Brook
Kerry Lapon
Winn Brook
Kathy Doyle
Winn Brook
Kristen Colavito
Winn Brook
Grade Level or Subject
Kindergarten
Kindergarten
Kindergarten
Kindergarten
Kindergarten Assistant
Guiding Theme
Differentiated Instruction/RTI
Integrated, Real-Life Experiences
 Acquisition of 21st Century Skills
Deepening Teacher Content Knowledge
Improving School Climate/Culture
Teaching the “Whole Student”
Other (explain) _______________________________________________________
Inquiry Question
How do we use a wide variety of text, class discussion and independent book choice in order to create
students who see themselves as lifelong independent readers?
Process
1. We determined that while our students typically make a lot of progress in reading skills during
the kindergarten year, they typically do not see themselves as readers and/or enjoy reading.
This is a problem since research has found that fluent readers with good comprehension are
students who read often.
2. We decided to focus our question on improving student perception of themselves as readers.
3. We used a reading survey adapted from Elementary Reading Attitude Survey from McKenna and
Kear in order to gather baseline data on students enjoyment of reading.
4. We used our baseline assessment data to focus on two questions in which we saw student
difficulty including whether or not students enjoy getting a book as a present instead of a toy,
and whether or not they enjoy reading instead of playing.
5. Each month we determined an author to focus on and specific activities to do with our students
to promote reading excitement. These activities included keeping an ongoing list of things that
“happy readers” do, having a “Pete the Cat” book sing along, writing book recommendations
and letters to favorite authors.
6. We reassessed students in February to determine progress and adapt accordingly.
7. We reassessed for a final time in April to determine the success of our project in improving
student attitudes towards reading.
Findings
Beginning of the year data:
How would you feel if you got a book for a gift instead of a toy?
Very Happy: 37
A Little Happy: 19
A Little Upset: 7
Very Upset: 25
How do you feel about reading instead of playing?
Very Happy: 19
A Little Happy: 25
A Little Upset: 21
Very Upset: 23
End of the year data:
How would you feel if you got a book for a gift instead of a toy?
Very Happy: 44
A Little Happy: 17
A Little Upset: 10
Very Upset: 12
How do you feel about reading instead of playing?
Very Happy: 26
A Little Happy: 24
A Little Upset: 15
Very Upset: 17
Overall Improvement:
How would you feel if you got a book for a gift instead of a toy?
Very Happy: +7
A Little Happy: -2
A Little Upset: +3
Very Upset: -8
How do you feel about reading instead of playing?
Very Happy: +7
A Little Happy: -1
A Little Upset: +6
Very Upset: -6
Recommendations / Next Steps
According to our data, we did have some improvement in student excitement about reading as noted by
the increase in children who feel very happy and the decrease in children who feel very upset. We have
the following recommendations for next steps in our project.
1. We could look closer at the data to determine if there was any discrepancy between boys and
girls excitement about reading. We could do some research and plan some lessons to specifically
target one gender or the other depending on which gender has lower excitement data.
2. We could focus more on improving student excitement about reading instruction in the
classroom as opposed to try to change children’s overall opinion about reading.
3. We could involve a home component to ask parents to get involved in changing their child’s
attitudes towards reading.