THAT'S A BOOK I WANT TO READ!
Reading Preferences of Adolescent Girls with Emotional Disturbance

By Erin E. Gaffen and MaryAnn Byrnes

The Problem

When I (Erin Gaffen) began teaching adolescent girls with emotional disorders, I used to tell my students what genre of book they had to read for their book reports and silent reading time. Assigned books usually related to our school curriculum. I did not understand why my students resisted silent reading and why many of them never turned in book reports.

During that first year, I noticed that a few books got rave reviews and were in high demand. I became interested in learning more about the particular books that my students enjoyed and about the specific factors that influenced their reading selections. Perhaps the struggles many of them had with reading stemmed from a lack of interest in the books they were assigned!

Reading is a necessary requirement for all subject areas in school. Students who are reluctant or inexperienced readers are more likely to have difficulty engaging in the curriculum. My students struggle with severe emotional disabilities, often as a result of traumatic lives. Because their experiences make it hard for them to focus on traditional school activities, they often fall far behind in academic work. Determining what factors motivate emotionally disturbed girls to read will help their teachers select material that will be of interest. Making reading more accessible and worthwhile will help these students develop reading skills and strategies and increase their motivation for reading.
This, in turn, will prepare students to better access the general curriculum, be more engaged in classroom reading, and become lifelong readers and learners.

What Does the Research Say?

Even if classics are great books, they don’t have the “special power” to motivate today’s typical students to read them (Bland, 2001). In order to increase reading enjoyment among students, Bland encourages English teachers to fill their classrooms with books that offer real, meaningful experiences and themes with which students can connect.

Not an avid reader as a child, Gallo (2001) found he had a narrow vocabulary and did not write well, making school assignments difficult. His interviews with students from several schools revealed the majority felt that their own book choices were more interesting than those selected by their teachers (Gallo, 2001). One of Gallo’s participants was quoted as saying, “The books I read on my own, you never want to put them down; the ones assigned, you never want to pick up.” (Gallo, 1984).

When students are interested in the subject matter of their reading material they develop the desire to learn for the sake of learning. Holloway (1999) reports that the way to improve adolescents’ reading skills is to help students develop an intrinsic motivation to read by linking reading assignments to realworld learning experiences, often not possible with the classics. This is especially so for students with emotional disturbance.

Several authors (Mitchell, 2001; Sprague and Keeling, 2000) support the idea that it is particularly important to present adolescent girls with books that portray female characters who meet challenges in order to help the readers examine the issues they face growing up in today’s society. Miller (1993) found improved self-concepts and self-confidence in adolescent girls with emotional disorders who read literature selections written by women depicting self-reliant and self-confident female protagonists who overcome difficult odds to accomplish goals. Supporting this finding, Guetzloe and Rockwell (2003) recommend carefully selecting literature as a tool to help prevent hopelessness in children (an experience all too common in the lives of my students). Literature depicting people facing and resolving their problems provides role models and examples of the experiences of others.

These current studies advocate strong, contemporary young adult novels for adolescents, including girls with emotional disorders. I wondered how the preferences of my students and their teachers matched those predicted by the literature.

The Girls and Their Teachers

All 18 of my students participated in this study. These young Caucasian women, ranging in age from 12 –17 years, were enrolled in our therapeutic residential school due to severe emotional disabilities.
The other 5 English teachers at my school also participated in this study. The teachers were all Caucasian with teaching experience at the school ranging from five months to four years.

What Kinds of Books Do Students Prefer to Read?

Students were asked to select from a list the genre(s) of books they preferred to read. Although every genre received some votes, the preferences were fairly clear.

• Fiction books were most highly preferred, selected by 72% of the girls
• Horror stories (chosen by 61% of the girls) and non-fiction books (50%) also were frequently chosen
• Autobiography (50%) was chosen more frequently than biography (33%)
• Mystery (39%) and fantasy (28%) were selected by a sizable number of girls
• Science fiction (11%), historical fiction (11%), self-help (6%) and romance (6%) were chosen least frequently of all

Asked to identify preferred subject matter, the most frequent response indicated students wanted to read about teenagers with problems.
One student wrote that she prefers to read about “kids going through the same stuff as me.” Another student responded that she was interested in reading about “kids who do drugs and their road back to recovery.”
Several students also mentioned that they want to read about “teens and their lives.”

The girls also had distinct opinions about the level of reading they preferred. Almost all (94%) of the girls indicated they prefer to read young adult novels; 72% also prefer adult novels.

What Books Did the Girls Recommend?

To see if actual reading choices matched stated preferences, I compared the list of books the girls had chosen to read during the first half of the year with preferences expressed on the item above.
A total of 30 books had been read and/or recommended by more than one girl.
Of these, 5 books were chosen by at least one-third of the students. They are listed below in order of choice.
Every one of these fictional or biographical books covers topics very close to the lives of my students.

• White Oleander, by Janet Fitch (teen daughter, living in foster homes, trying to build her identity while her mother is in prison)
• Pure, by Rebbecca Ray (autobiography of adolescent girl’s personal and sexual struggles to leave her family and join the “in” crowd)
• The Lost Boy: A Foster Child’s Search for the Love of a Family, by Dave Pelzer, (autobiography of a young boy’s experiences through foster homes and the social service and juvenile justice systems; sequel to A Child Called It)
• Speak, by Laurie Halse Anderson (teen girl becomes mute after being raped)
• Cut, by Patricia McCormick (reflections of adolescent girl in residential psychiatric hospital)

What Factors Influence Reading Choices?

While interesting to know what kinds of books students chose to read, I wanted to learn what else influenced the girls’ reading.
Students and teachers were asked to rate from 1 to 5 (1=Not considered; 5=Always considered) the importance of specific factors when choosing books to read.
The students were asked to reflect on their own decisions. The teachers were asked what they thought their students valued.
The average rankings for both students and teachers are shown in the table below.

There was agreement at both ends of the spectrum. Students and teachers identified subject matter and peer recommendations as the most important factors students consider when choosing a book to read.
Both agreed that having a book on tape (thereby avoiding direct reading) is not an important factor.

A surprising difference appeared regarding the importance of teacher recommendations.
For my students, a teacher’s recommendation was almost as important as that of a peer.
In contrast, teachers felt their own recommendations to be one of the least important factors. What they recommend mattered much more to students than teachers thought!

Implications for Practice

Although this was a small sample, I have learned much about selecting books for my adolescent female students with emotional and behavioral disabilities. Hopefully, these lessons will be as helpful to others as they have been to me.

• Student preferences matched predictions of previous research. My students were drawn to books about issues faced in their own lives. All student-recommended books focused on teens working to conquer difficult life issues. Main characters were not always successful in resolving these problems.
• Even though some of my students seem to struggle with reading, they would rather read a young adult or adult book than one with a lower reading level. It would be interesting to compare student reaction to books with similar adolescent topics, but differing reading levels.
• Teachers at this school significantly underestimated the importance of their book recommendations to students.
  We need to change our own perceptions! Perhaps teachers should take the advice of Mitchell (2001) to heart. She encourages all English teachers of adolescents to become readers of young adult literature because it provides ways to interact with the students about issues that are real in their lives and allows teachers to recommend inspiring reading for the class.
  We must not pass up this opportunity to encourage students to read!

These results have changed my own selection of reading material.
I am reading more of the literature my students recommend; this increases our conversations and my ability to recommend other books they might like.
I consider student preferences more when I buy books.
My students now make their own choices of reading material for silent reading period and book reports, and this has increased their enjoyment of reading.
Even students who say they have never read before joining my classroom now complete books independently.
Presently, silent reading period is the most peaceful part of the school day for both my students and me. And, most importantly, my students enjoy their reading!

Erin E. Gaffen, M.Ed., is the Assistant Principal at the Germaine Lawrence School. She can be reached at egaffen@germainelawrence.org
MaryAnn Byrnes, Ed.D., is an Assistant Professor at the University of Massachusetts Boston. Her email address is maryann.byrnes@umb.edu

References

Bland, G. (2001). Out with the old, in with the (not so) new.
English Journal, 90(3), 20-22.

Gallo, D. R. (2001). How classics create an aliterate society. English Journal, 90(3), 33-39.

Gallo, D. R. (1984). Reactions to required reading: Some implications from a study of Connecticut students.
Connecticut English Journal, 15(2), 7-11.

Guetzloe, E. & Rockwell, S. (2003). Preventing hopelessness in children and adolescents. Beyond Behavior, 12(3), 20-24.

Holloway, J. H. (1999). Improving the reading skills of adolescents. Educational Leadership, 57(2), 80-81.

Johnson, C. E., Wan, G., Templeton, R. A., Graham, L. P.,
& Sattler, J. L. (2000). “Booking it” to peace: Bibliotherapy guidelines for teachers. ERIC Document Reproduction Service No. ED451622.

[Retrieved February 27, 2003] from the World Wide Web:
Miller, D. (1993, April). Teaching adolescents with behavioral/emotional disorders, adolescent offenders, and adolescents at-risk: A literature-based approach. Paper presented at the Annual Convention of the Council for
Exceptional Children, San Antonio, TX.

Mitchell, D. (2001). Young adult literature and the English teacher. English Journal, 90(3), 23-25.

Smith, S. A. (2001, April). “What we are and what we’re not”: Early adolescent girls negotiate their identities through talk about text.
Paper presented at the Annual Conference of the American Educational Research Association, Seattle, WA.

Sprague. M .M., & Keeling, K.K. (2000). A library for Ophelia. Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy, 43(7), 640- 647.