Survey results: parents tell us about their son's experience of learning to read

Thanks to all the mums and dads who filled in our survey about their son's experience of learning to read. It was fantastic to receive 49 completed surveys. And boy did our parents have a lot to say about school readers and learning to read in the early years. Thanks so much — your insights are invaluable.

Also, congratulations to Lesley Richards who won the cool pack of books for her son William (personally selected by Oscar due to their coolness!)

The feedback showed that many parents and their sons have found learning to read very challenging and frustrating. However, there were a few families who have had very positive experiences of learning to read in the early years.

So now we will let the numbers, and the parents, speak for themselves…

The numbers

This is what you told us:

1. 42% of boys LOVE books, but only 8% LOVE most school readers.

2. 46% of parents described most school readers as DULL and 25% described them as YAWNINGLY-BORING.

3. 41% of boys OFTEN don’t want to read their school reader for homework.

4. 20% of parents said their son had been turned off reading because he doesn’t like school readers.

5. 39% of parents said their son’s experience of learning to read in the early years was FRUSTRATING and 39% said it was CHALLENGING.

6. 84% of parents said they would like school readers to be DIFFERENT.

The comments

“Readers should be relevant to Australia, with fun and exciting stories, and interesting/engaging topics for boys. They need good pictures and characters but still supportive of a very high quality reading program.”

“Some learners like to read information books. There needs to be more of these so there is choice. Children also do not want to read every night, sometimes they are tired and have done enough work for the day!”

“We have not actually bothered with school readers for the past 1-2 years. He gets his own books from the library and would easily read for 1/2hr or more by himself so we don't listen to him read except for sometimes reading the kids bedtime books.”

“An actual story would be nice.”

“It would be great if schools could purchase updated reading materials every couple of years.”

“Because his reader is on a low level it is difficult to get interesting books that don’t sound baby like.”

“This son was happy with school readers as he liked narratives more than non fiction, but my other son prefers non fiction so he didn’t like the readers.”

“Our challenge is a little more complicated. His reading level is WELL below his age and comprehension level and therefore what he is able to read he finds VERY boring. He has never liked reading through and the school readers did nothing to assist in encouraging him to read. He has always found them boring and I would say irrelevant.”

“My son finds school readers interesting because he has nothing to compare it to. When he brings home a reader with actual information or a funny story line, the difference in his enthusiasm is amazing. This happens rarely. I also noticed there was nothing interesting in the content at all until about Level 8.”

“I had a child who loathed reading very, very tedious Biff and Kipper books which have been torturing English children for centuries. An enlightened teacher changed his books and changed his outlook.”

The final word

Thank you for all the wonderful suggestions about topics and ideas to improve school readers. I’ve always believed that if you don’t like something, do something about it, which is how this idea to make readers appealing to boys came about.

It’s a mission of mine to hook all young boys into reading. I want young boys to LOVE reading as much as they love riding their bike, fishing or kicking a ball. I’m sure if we keep listening to what parents, boys and teachers have to say that we can help our boys on the magical journey of learning to read — and to LOVE it!