Conclusion

There is lots of information on the topic "encouraging children to read". A lot of the older books on the topic deal with the more traditional ways this is achieved. More recently published books however do talk about using the internet to improve reading skills which then may encourage children to open a book. The main problem I encountered when researching the topic was that literacy is a very broad area and encouraging children to read crossed over into many other closely related topics.

The internet contains many forms of electronic data relating to the topic and this can be found on the very basic commercial websites and more authorative government and educational websites. The Premiers Reading Challenge shows how the internet is being used to get information to the people. There is a web page and the Premier is also on Youtube explaining the benefits of the challenge and the importance of reading.

Print and non print materials were both used to assess the topic and both had advantages and disadvantages in their use which is discussed in my report.

One common feature of the research results however was that reading to your children will have a positive influence on them.

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION

Have managed to get a couple more books on the topic which have been helpful through interlibrary loan. I didn't think I would get them on time. One really useful one is "101 ways to get your child read" by Patience Thomson. It was published in 2009 so it is nice to find a "newer" book on the topic. It is good because in this book she addresses other ways to get children to read such as the internet.

Also received a book by Ilana Snyder called "The Literacy Wars" which is relevant because in a lot of the research there is the underlying factor that literacy is always being portrayed in the media in a negative light. Won't get into that too much though.

General OneFile had a fantastic article called "Making Time" by Oakley, Grace and Jenny Jay which looked at the introduction of electronic talking books. It talked about the advantages and disadvantages of them through a study that was undertaken. It was good to find a comprehensive article dealing with newer technology.

Managed to get flickr working the other night. Finally got to upload some photos which will be useful.

As I won't be able to be at the presentations I have decided to do a report on the topic. Although this does seem a bit boring after trying out powerpoint and photo story.

ELECTRONIC RESOURCES FOR INFORMATION

There is so much information out there on the topic of "encouraging children to read". Due to the amount of information I have narrowed my research to early primary school children.

A lot of commercial websites do have good information but it is really distracting to see adds moving across the page. One website which I found useful was Kidspot which lists ways to encourage reading. Some of these are fairly basic which they acknowledge themselves but others are useful and practical.

There is also a lot of information on the "Premiers Reading Challenge for 2009" and this includes the Premier on You Tube talking about the challenge. There is a direct link through the Public Library website. I also found the media releases from the Premier and one which is focusing on Education Week which has just finished. In this media release the Premier talks about the new literacy brochure to help parents read to children.

I have found that subscribing to websites with an RSS feed is not as good. There is just too much information being sent and a lot of it is not relevant to the topic. I think you need to be really careful when you subscribe to make sure the website covers exactly what you need.

It is all starting to come together which is good. The new applications we have tried are not quite so daunting. I think I can say now after this subject that I have been using the internet the wrong way all these years.

SLOW PROGRESS

Making slow progress. Have found two really good books on my topic. One is by Mem Fox "Reading Magic" and the other is by a Teacher-Librarian, Gloria Rolton called "Read to Me". There is so much information on the topic. Also been trying out the online bib citations which are really useful.

Fox, Mem. Reading Magic. Orlando, Florida: Harcourt Books, 2008.

Rolton, gloria. Read to Me. Camberwell, Victoria: Acer Press, 2001.

The above citations were made through the Oslis website. http://www.oslis.org/resources/cm/mlacitationss

Still working on my online resources.

WHAT THIS BLOG IS ABOUT

This blog has been set up as part of course that I am studying at the polytechnic. The course is develop and use information literacy skills. The topic that I am going to evaluate is how to encourage children to read. As I have not had a blog before this is all new to me.

First practice at setting up a blog.