Has your child cracked a book this summer?
Although adults often jump at the chance to catch up on their reading during vacations, many children and teenagers, particularly those from low-income families, read few, if any, books during the summer break from school.
But the price for keeping the books closed is a high one. Several studies have documented a “summer slide” in reading skills once school lets out each spring. The decline in reading and spelling skills are greatest among low-income students, who lose the equivalent of about two months of school each summer, according to the National Summer Learning Association, an education advocacy group. And the loss compounds each year.
Now new research offers a surprisingly simple, and affordable, solution to the summer reading slide. In a three-year study, researchers at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, found that simply giving low-income children access to books at spring fairs — and allowing them to choose books that most interested them — had a significant effect on the summer reading gap.
The study, financed by the federal Department of Education, tracked the reading habits and test scores of more than 1,300 Florida children from 17 low-income schools. Most of the children were poor enough to receive discounted or free school lunches.
The researchers wanted to study whether providing books to young children during the summer would affect school performance over the years. At the start of the study, 852 randomly selected first- and second-graders attended a school book fair in the spring, where they were allowed to browse from 600 book titles.
A variety of books were offered, ranging from those about celebrities like Britney Spears and “The Rock” to stories of fictional characters like the spunky troublemaker Junie B. Jones. Children could also select from culturally relevant books featuring African-American characters, as well as from books in Spanish.
The children chose 12 books. The researchers also selected at random a control group of 478 children who weren’t given reading books. Those children were offered free activity and puzzle books.
The book fairs and activity book giveaways continued for three summers until the study participants reached the fourth and fifth grades. Then the researchers compared reading test scores for the two groups.
Children who had received free books posted significantly higher test scores than the children who received activity books. The effect, 1/16th of a standard deviation in test scores, was equivalent to a child attending three years of summer school, according to the report to be published in September in the journal Reading Psychology. The difference in scores was twice as high among the poorest children in the study.
The findings come as many school districts are considering slashing summer programs to save money, according to a recent survey by the American Association of School Administrators. The study showed that providing free books, for a cost of about $50 per child, is a much more affordable way for schools to spur summer learning, said a study co-author, Anne McGill-Franzen, professor and director of the reading center at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville.
One of the most notable findings was that children improved their reading scores even though they typically weren’t selecting the curriculum books or classics that teachers normally assigned for summer reading. That conclusion confirms other studies suggesting that children learn best when they are allowed to select their own books.
Surprisingly, the most popular book during the first year of the Florida study was a biography of Britney Spears.
“What that said to me was that there is a kid culture and a media culture that transcends what we think kids should be reading,” Dr. McGill-Franzen said. “I don’t think the majority of these kids ever read during the summer, but given the opportunity to select their own books and discuss what they knew about, ‘The Rock’ or Hannah Montana or Junie B. Jones was, in itself, motivating to them.”
Ellen Galinsky, president of the Families and Work Institute and author of a new book about how children learn, “Mind in the Making,” said she hoped that the findings would encourage parents and teachers to allow children to select their own reading material.
“A child’s interests are a door into the room of reading,” said Ms. Galinsky, who said her own son turned away from books during grade school. Because he liked music, she encouraged him to read music magazines or books about musicians. Her son later regained an interest in reading and has a Ph.D.
“If your child is turned off by reading, getting them to read anything is better than nothing,” she said.
But giving children a choice in the books they read is a message many parents resist.
At a bookstore recently, Dr. McGill-Franzen said she witnessed an exchange between some mothers encouraging their fifth- and sixth-grade daughters to read biographies of historical figures, when the girls wanted to select books about Hannah Montana, a character played by the pop star Miley Cyrus.
“If those books get them into reading, that has great repercussions for making them smarter,” Dr. McGill-Franzen said. “Teachers and middle-class parents undervalue kids’ preferences, but I think we need to give up being so uptight about children’s choices in books.”
A version of this article appeared in print on July 20, 2010, on page D1 of the New York edition of The Times.