Browsing by Author "Laukkanen, Annika"

Aims. The decline in reading skills and reading habits of Finnish children and adolescents has been a concern in Finnish society. The decline in reading skills has been noticed in PISA-surveys. It is worrying that particularly the number of adolescents with poor reading skills has been increasing. Previous research has shown that reading skills correlate with reading motivation and reading habits. The aim of this study was to investigate how a classroom teacher can promote children’s reading motivation. Also the aim was to examine the ways in which reading is displayed in learning environment and in what ways does the teacher use materials received from Lukuklaani research project. This study creates an in-depth look at one classroom teacher and examines the ways how that teacher promotes children’s reading motivation. Methods. This study was conducted as a qualitative case study as part of Lukuklaani research project. The participant was a fourth-grade teacher who is experienced, thinks reading is important, is interested in motivating children to read and tries to promote reading motivation by using different methods. The data of this study was collected by interviewing and observing the teacher and taking photographs of school environment. The data was collected during two days in spring semester of 2019. Theory-based content analysis was used to analyse the data. The theoretical framework used in this study consisted of motivation studies and self-determination theory. Results and conclusions. This study showed that the teacher in this study used diverse methods to promote children’s reading motivation. The used methods satisfied basic human needs presented in self-determination theory. There were many different reading-related things displayed in school environment. Books received from Lukuklaani-project were available for students to read and teachers had also created different tasks and assignments related to those books. A guide to reading circles that was received from Lukuklaani was little used. Based on this study teacher can promote children’s reading motivation by being a model of a reader, supporting children’s reading skill development, providing children chances to make their own choices and organizing social activities related to reading.