Recently, The Sydney Morning Herald published a feature on the 2024 What Kids Are Reading Report by Renaissance Education, based on data from the Accelerated Reader Program, used by 440 schools across Australia.
Source: Harris, C. 2024. "Devices eroding teens' reading attention. The Sydney Morning Herald, October 26: 9.
A table towards the top right of the article lists the top 20 books read by students in Years 9 to 12. While the number of books read by students has increased, concerns were raised about the difficulty of reading texts—students opting for easier rather than more challenging reads.
Diana Wing (Renaissance Education Australia) attributes this to a preference for social media and, hence, a preference for literature that does not require sustained focus.
The challenge for me, as a Teacher Librarian, and for every Teacher Librarian, is to encourage and provide access to more challenging texts that require a more sustained focus. This adds to the challenge of just getting a person to read.
The second half of the article focuses on the role of school libraries in advocating for reading. Author Andy Griffiths stated that "libraries were essential to building a school's reading culture and ensuring that students, teachers and parents had access to and knowledge of a panoply of books".
