Reading Promotions, Check Out Levels and Student Achievement

By Cathy Clowes This study attempts to single out two factors that may affect student achievement in reading as recorded by Measures of Academic Progress (MAP) test. One factor is the participation of students in a voluntary school wide reading promotion which in this case was called Battle of the Books. The other is student use of the library print collection which is defined by the number of books checked out during a year. I first became interested in correlating student achievement on the MAP reading tests and Battle of the Books after observing two female students with lower fall MAP scores improve dramatically in both attitude and aptitude for reading. Both students fell into a range between the 25th and 35th percentiles in the fall. Both were also the most enthusiastic participants in the reading promotion as judged by their animated retelling of favorite parts of plots from the books every time I saw them. I was curious to see how this participation affected their achievement on the MAP tests. As I expected, their achievement levels went up significantly into the average to above average range. I also noticed that both girls were top library patrons. I began to wonder whether my anecdotal observations of the positive correlation between library use and participation in a reading challenge might reflect an important trend in the larger school population as well. After putting the statistics together I noticed that Battle of the Books participation does appear to correlate positively with raised reading scores. Battle of the Books participants made up 60 percent of students who raised their reading score. Higher library book check out rates also correlated positively with raised reading scores. In students who had very high improvement as defined by 10 or more points raised over norm, the book check out rate was the highest and also appears to be more significant than Battle of the Books participation. Interestingly, all students who did not raise their scores had lower check out rates.

Many factors affect student achievement. It is important to realize that this study only indicates a possible contribution to student achievement, but is not to be interpreted as cause and effect. The use of reading promotions and the offering of library book check out do not in themselves cause higher achievement, but they likely do encourage students to voluntarily spend more time engaged in independent reading. Reading promotions and access to library resources are therefore important tools for schools to offer their students for the purpose of improving reading skills through increased voluntary independent silent reading time.

Definitions
BOB = Battle of Books Participants Non BOB = Non Battle of Books Participants 10 point over Norm Growth = Students who raised their score 10 or more points above what was expected growth for their achievement level. An example might be a student

who raised a reading score by 20 points in comparison to a norm expected growth level of 10. This students growth then exceeds what is expected by the norm by 10 points. Raised Score = Students who scored at an adjusted level at or above the norm expected achievement growth for their achievement range on the MAP reading. Students scores are only consider raised if they achieve at a level equal to or more than what is expected by the norm growth figures for that student. For example, a student who shows a raw growth of 7 points at an achievement level that normally shows a 7 point growth, has grown as expected according to norm and has a raised score. Lowered Score = Students who scored at an adjusted lowered level based on what they should have scored according to norms. For example, some students may have achieved a raw 4 point raise in their reading score, but the expected rise based on norms for students at the same achievement level was 8. This means that the student actually did not raise their score as expected and their growth figure is actually equal to -4. Check out level = An average figure taken from numbers gathered from individual check out records.
Battle of the Books and Reading Scores
70%

Percent Students

60% 50% 40% 30% 20% 10% 0% BOB non BOB Population All Students

10 point over Norm Growth Raised Score Lowered Score

Figure 1: 60 percent of students who raised their score participated in Battle of the Books, while 40 percent did not. Interestingly, those with a 10 point or more rise in score over the norm expected growth were not as likely to have participated in Battle of the Books. This may be explained by this groups significantly higher check out rate as shown next in figure 2. See exact numbers for figure 1a above below:
Participation in BOB 10 point over Norm Growth Raised Score Lowered Score BOB 45% 60% 52% non BOB 55% 40% 48% All Students 10% 53% 47%

Number of Books Checked out and Reading Scores

number of books checked out
90 80 70 60 50 40 30 20 10 0 All BOB non BOB Lowered Score 10 point over Norm Growth Raised Score

Figure 2: Students who raised their scores all had higher check out levels than those who did not. The check out level is defined by an average. Although a difference of 6 -20 books may not seem significant on an individual level, as an average figure it indicates a significant trend toward higher book check outs for students who had gains in reading scores.
Book Check Out 10 point over Norm Growth Raised Score Lowered Score All 70 69 63 BOB 66 68 62 non BOB 77 68 62