Canada: Fewer Children Read for Pleasure, Report Finds

Direct to Full Text Report: Reading for Joy (via People for Education)
A five page PDF file.
Reported on by the CBC:

A report published Monday finds that fewer Ontario children are reading for pleasure.
The report, published by research group People for Education, shows the number of Ontario Grade 3 students who say they like to read dropped from 75 per cent in 1998-99 to 50 per cent in 2010-11.
The number of students in Grade 6 who said they enjoy reading fell from 65 per cent to 50 per cent in the same period, according to the study.
The data comes from surveys of more than 240,000 Grade 3 and Grade 6 students from the province’s Education Quality and Accountability Office and research from the OED.
[Our emphasis] The report points to a reduction in the number of teacher-librarians as a one reason for the decline.
In the school year starting in 2010, only 56 per cent of Ontario elementary schools had a teacher-librarian (with 80 per cent of those working part time), a decline from 76 per cent in 1998-99.

Read the Complete Article
http://www.peopleforeducation.ca/wp-content/uploads/2011/12/People-for-Education-report-on-students-reading-enjoyment-Reading-for-Joy.pdf

Filed under: Academic Libraries, Data Files, School Libraries