Promoting and sustaining positive attitudes to reading and encouraging children to read for pleasure is crucial, so that children become independent readers and continue to develop their reading skills outside of school.  Our research has shown that motivation to read is important for developing children’s reading skills over time, and appears to be particularly important for poor readers, who typically suffer from lower levels of reading motivation.  Children’s reading attitudes, motivation and confidence is related to their reading attainment from a relatively young age, this relationship continues into adolescence.  As teachers, it is important to identify ways to promote reading for pleasure and enhance reading motivation, attitudes and confidence.

Please read more about our specific studies in the posters below, and see McGeown (2013) for a Teacher Handbook on this topic.

McGeown, S. P. Johnston, R., Walker, J., Howason, K., Stockburn, A., & Dufton, P (2015). The relationship between young children’s reading attitudes, confidence and attainment.  Educational Research, 57, 389-402.
mcgeown-johnson-walker-et-al-2015

McGeown, S. P.  (2013). Reading motivation and engagement in the primary school classroom: A handbook for teachers.  United Kingdom Literacy Association Minibook.
UKLA website

McGeown, S. P., Duncan, L. G., Griffiths, Y., & Stothard, S. E.  (2015). Exploring the relationship between adolescents’ reading skills, reading motivation and reading habits.  Reading and Writing: An Interdisciplinary Journal, 28, 545-569.
mcgeown-duncan-et-al-2015

Medford, E., & McGeown, S. (2011). Cognitive and motivational factors for reading: The need for a domain specific approach to motivation.  In Psychology of Motivation: New Research. (Eds. J. Franco & A. Svensgaard).  Nova Science Publications.
medford-mcgeown-2011-book-chapter

Medford, E., & McGeown, S. P.  (2012). The influence of personality characteristics on children’s reading motivation.  Learning and Individual Differences, 22, 786-791. 
medford-mcgeown-2012

McGeown, S. P, Norgate, R., & Warhurst, A.  (2012). Exploring intrinsic and extrinsic reading motivation among very good and very poor readers. Educational Research, 54, 309-322. 
mcgeown-norgate-warhurst-2012

Logan, S., Medford, E., & Hughes, N.  (2011).   The importance of intrinsic motivation for high and low ability readers’ reading comprehension performance.  Learning and Individual Differences, 21,124-128.
logan-medford-hughes-2011

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