Background
Key research findings suggest that
- ‘Being more enthusiastic about reading, and a frequent
reader, was more of an advantage on its own than having well
educated parents in good jobs.’
- ‘Reading for pleasure rather than the type of reading
material was a stronger indicator of success although the more
diverse the range of material a student read for pleasure,
the better they performed in literacy tests.’
Reading for Change 2002, report for OECD’s
Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA)
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Flash movie
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These research findings
prompted dcs to look at a variety of ways of promoting
wide reading and in particular to explore what video conferencing
might contribute. Jenny Lloyd, adviser for English, talks
briefly about the context video conferencing provides for
book talk and particularly its impact on the attitudes
of boys to talking about their reading. |
Underpinning principles
The Devon English team has focused on the importance of ‘book
talk’ in enhancing the enjoyment of reading drawing on
the work of Aidan Chambers (Book Talk, Thimble Press 1993) and
Neil Mercer (Words and Minds, Routledge 2000). Neil Mercer points
out that ‘ a common consequence of the popularity of a
work of fiction is that people who have read it, talk about it.’ Video
conferencing provides a context which can capture what Neil Mercer
calls ‘the dynamic, interactive way in which people create
frameworks for joint understanding in conversation’. In
genuine communication, understanding is negotiated between speaker
and listener and this can lead to deeper understanding and perhaps
new meanings. This won’t happen in every video conference
conversation.There are examples of this in the exchanges between
the gifted and talented students in Case
Study 2.
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