Reading Partners (LesepartnerInnen)
All scientific studies have shown the enormous effect pre-school and school-accompanying reading habits can have on the future reading and learning success of children. Fluency in reading is best achieved by regularly reading aloud and in the company of others. Children who are weak readers can best be helped by reading tutors. The Book Club and the Austrian Ministry of Education are putting various aspects of ‘reading in company’ at the centre of their ‘Reading partners – partner reading’ initiative. After the pilot phase (June 2007 to January 2008), the initiative is now open for all Austrian schools who want to put one of the five projects into practice.
The aims of the LesepartnerInnen (Reading Partners) campaign
LesepartnerInnen as a campaign for the promotion of reading culture at school is an important systemic addition to regular teaching. The campaign “LesepartnerInnen“
> integrates parents and school partners
> provides an individual promotion of reading skills for children
> facilitates the progression from kindergarten to primary school
> integrates day-care
> supports reading competence in terms of the EU benchmarks.
The five projects
Schools are invited to implement one of the five internationally approved projects: • Reading Tutors
For three months, adults read with a poorly reading child for 15 minutes per day (based on the Salzburg survey of Landerl/Moser).
> Reading tutors
For three months, adults read with a poorly-reading child for 15 minutes per day (based on the Salzburg survey of Landerl/Moser).
>Parents as reading partners
For three months, parents commit to reading with their child for 15 minutes five times a week (accompanied by school activities).
> Reading buddies
Older pupils start reading partnerships with a younger class, reading regularly with their younger buddies at least once a week.
> ‘Little’ reading bridge
Reading projects involving a primary school and a kindergarten, preparing the younger pupils for reading and motivating the older pupils.
> ‘Big’ reading bridge
Reading projects involving a primary school and a secondary school, preparing the younger children for reading at secondary school level and motivating the older pupils.
Results of the pilot phase
Starting in September 2007, 40 Austrian schools (primary and secondary schools) implemented one of the four LesepartnerInnen projects. The results of the pilot phase, which were evaluated by the Sozialwissenschaftliches Forschungsbüro (Mag. Andreas Baumgartner), prove that reading competence can only by improved by systemic and long-term measures, and stress the importance of social aspects in reading promotion. Both reading competence and reading motivation improved considerably in each of the four projects. Furthermore, the pilot teachers also witnessed an improvement of the social fabric in their classes. It can thus be assumed that the LesepartnerInnen projects are appropriate measures to level out socially-caused differences in reading culture.
LesepartnerInnen 2008/2009
The considerable success of the pilot phase called for the continuation of the LesepartnerInnen campaign, which offers a positively motivating approach, is highly integrative and supports individualisation as well as differentiation. The social aspects of the campaign (integration of the parents, promotion of reading culture at schools, encouragement of friendships by reading) and the bridge connecting different school types (kindergarten and primary school, or primary and secondary school) all correspond with the results of the latest PISA and PIRLS surveys. Thus, the LesepartnerInnen campaign now encourages reading projects at all Austrian schools as a sensible and feasible low-budget measure in line with school reform.
The website provides detailed descriptions of the projects, updates of all the necessary materials (including letters to the parents and projects reports by the participants of the pilot phase.
This project is run by Buchklub der Jugend (Austria)