Reading Engagement for Tweens and Teens: What Would Make Them Read More?

Identifies evidence-backed and easy-to-implement strategies for encouraging young people to read, and helps you to position your library as an indispensable resource for supporting reading.

While most reading research focuses on young children, this book looks at how to support reading beyond the early years and into adulthood. Reporting on strong, peer-reviewed research supported by sound theoretical and methodological approaches, it emphasizes the practical implications of these findings, sharing what this means for you in terms of how you can be a powerful positive reading model and influence in young people’s lives.

Enriched with the voices of today’s young people, the book includes quotes that allow readers to decide how to support reading engagement for tweens and teens based on what would make them read more, as expressed in their own words. Engaging and readable, it will be of interest to school and public librarians and can be shared with teachers, parents, and other literacy instructors and advocates.

Considers strategies for countering the biggest barriers to reading as identified by young people

Explains how to most effectively implement common strategies to support reading engagement at your school, such as implementing sustained silent reading, having conversations about books, and reading aloud to older children

Offers strategies for promoting awareness of the ongoing value of reading and for teaching parents and teachers to encourage reading beyond the point of independent reading skill acquisition

Moves away from generalizations that reinforce gender stereotypes and stereotypes about tweens and teens related to their technology use and skills

Highlights the importance of access to books and provides evidence for the role of libraries as reading-supportive spaces