Teenagers´ reading preferences: how to motivate students to read

ISFD N° 30 PROFESORADO DE INGLÉS LENGUA Y EXPRESIÓN ESCRITA IV ACEVEDO JULIETA Y GALLARDO MARISA 2012

Teenagers´ reading preferences: how to motivate students to read

Nowadays, students at secondary school are exposed to texts that are not appealing to them and this discourages their classroom reading habit.

Usually, when teachers from secondary school prepare their lessons, they choose texts without taking into account what teenagers like the most. We have carried out a survey about adolescents´ likes as regard reading and we will discuss the relevance of taking this information in consideration when teaching.

The data collected will be useful for teachers to select material that is in accordance to the students´ preferences. Teachers should consider that knowing what teenagers like reading will help them to motivate students to read.

The students who took part in the survey attend a private school from Ituzaingó, Greater Buenos Aires, Argentina. They were female and male teenagers from twelve to nineteen who belong to middle class. Adolescents were asked about their age and their preferences as regard literary genres and types of text.

After analysing the information collected we did two bar graphics to organize student’s answers in order to have a visual aid to see the results more clearly.

These

are

the

graphics,

ISFD N° 30 PROFESORADO DE INGLÉS LENGUA Y EXPRESIÓN ESCRITA IV ACEVEDO JULIETA Y GALLARDO MARISA 2012

According to the survey, what adolescents like reading the most is social networks. Nowadays, teenagers spend most of their free time in front of a computer. It seems to be that social networks play an important role in their life since they use them to share their feelings, to communicate with their friends and to know about the world.

ISFD N° 30 PROFESORADO DE INGLÉS LENGUA Y EXPRESIÓN ESCRITA IV ACEVEDO JULIETA Y GALLARDO MARISA 2012

Teenagers declared novels and short stories as their second choice, and poems was the less chosen option. As regard genre, the most selected were humour, adventure, science fiction and horror, and the less accepted were fantasy and everyday life stories.

If we take into account the age factor, the survey shows that there are some differences. The first choice as regard type of text is the same for adolescents from twelve to fifteen and for adolescents from sixteen to nineteen.

Both of them chose social networks. But the second one is different. Younger teenagers chose novels and older ones chose short stories. As regard genre, the elections were dissimilar. Younger teenagers selected humour and older adolescents, adventure.

This information is useful for the educational environment since nowadays, students seem to be reluctant to read in class. Teachers should leave the traditional texts aside and prepare lessons using social networks.

Students communicate through them and read from them every day so teachers should make use of these sources to engage students.

Facebook is one of the social networks to which adolescents have access. They upload pictures, comment on their friends ‘posts, write about their lives and post jokes. Teachers can make use of these humorous texts to engage their students since it was one of the most selected genre, they should leave the traditional texts aside and prepare lessons in which social networks play an important role.

Teachers should take into account students´ preferences when preparing their lessons. If teachers select the appropriate material, students will enjoy reading texts that are appealing to them and also their reading habit will be encouraged.