Research Article Summary and Reflection

This is my research article summary and reflection. The article, "Addressing Summer Reading Setback among Economically Disadvantaged Elementary Students " was written by Richard L. Allington and Anne McGill-Franzen and describes the purpose method and results of their study that tested their hypothesis that providing elementary school students from low income families with the supply of self-selected books would improve summer reading setback.

Research Article Summary and Reflection

Joseph Rezac

MAS 7998 Reading Practicum III

In their article “Addressing Summer Reading Setback Among Economically

Disadvantaged Elementary Students” Richard L Allington and Anne McGill Franzen described

the purpose, method and results of their study that tested their hypothesis that providing

elementary school students from low-income families with a supply of self-selected books

would improve summer reading setback. The article was originally published in Reading

Psychology: An International Journal Fall 2010.

The summer reading setback is a well-established phenomenon (Alexander, Entwisle, &

Olson, 2007; Allington & McGill-Franzen, 2003; Cooper, Nye, Charlton, Lindsay, &

Greathouse, 1996; Entwisle, Alexander, & Olson, 1997) Briefly, research on summer learning

loss has provided reliable evidence that the reading achievement of economically disadvantaged

students slides back a few months every summer. Although the role that summer reading setback

plays in the reading achievement gap between economically disadvantaged and economically

advantaged students began to be discussed 20 to 30 years ago (Hayes & Grether, 1983; Heyns,

1978, 1987), little educational policies addressing either the issue or the impact of summer

reading setback has been produced. (Allington & McGill-Franzen, 2010). Allington and McGill-
Franzen designed their study as an initial step in developing an evidence base for interventions

that might address summer reading setback and thereby narrow the persistent achievement gap

between more and less economically advantaged children. In their study they incorporate factors

that influence the summer reading setback such as summer reading activity and book access.

Additionally, they conducted their study over a three-year period. The majority of previous

studies had been conducted over only a one-year period.

Allington and McGill-Franzen selected students from 17 high poverty elementary schools

into large school districts in Florida. The students were divided into two groups, an experimental

treatment group and a control group. For three consecutive years the children the experimental

treatment group selected books during a book fair that Allington and McGill-Franzen ran to

supply books for summer reading. The children of the control group received no books. Both

groups were considered demographically equivalent(Allington & McGill-Franzen, 2010). As a

primary measure of reading proficiency, they relied on the state-mandated reading assessment

known as The Florida Comprehensive Achievement Test (FCAT). They gathered survey data at

the end of each summer from both the treatment and the control groups. Questions and possible

responses were read aloud to participants to ensure they understood the questions being asked.

The primary interest was with items that requests information about summer reading activity,

access to books, and home reading support(Allington & McGill-Franzen, 2010). In the spring of

each year a book fair was held at each school and the students were able to come down and

select 15 books of which they would receive 12. The books available were selected by a research

team with a concern for text difficulty and interestingness. Books were selected in four broad

categories: Pop Culture, books that feature characters and topics that were current in the broader

popular media, Series Books, titles from the most popular series books as indicated by sales

figures, Culturally Relevant, books by minority authors and/or featured minority characters or

regional themes, and Curriculum Relevant, books whose topics were topics that would be

studied by the participants of the study the following year(Allington & McGill-Franzen, 2010).

Allington and McGill-Franzen’s findings indicate that providing easy access to self-
selected books for summer reading over successive years does, in fact, limit summer reading

setback. “We found that the experimental treatment group, which received the summer books for

three consecutive summers, reported more often engaging in voluntary summer reading and had

significantly higher reading achievement than the control group” (Allington & McGill-Franzen,

2010). They also found that the reading gains the students from the most economically

disadvantaged families in the study were found to be larger, perhaps because he students have

the most restricted access to books. Allington and McGill-Franzen state that their longitudinal

outcomes are more consistent larger than those reported for other summer book interventions.

They also state of their study differs from earlier summer book studies in several ways: younger

subjects completed grades one and two at outset versus completed grades 3,4,5 or 6, self-selected

summer books versus experimenter-selected books, three years of book distribution versus single

yearbook distribution(Allington & McGill-Franzen, 2010). Each of these factors, Allington &

McGill-Franzen state, may be important in explaining the observed positive effects on reading achievement.

Allington & McGill-Franzen conclude that their study provides the best evidence to date

that ensuring easy and continuing access to self-selected books for summer reading is one

potential strategy for addressing summer reading setback and, therefore addressing the reading

achievement gap that exists between students from more and less economically advantaged

families(Allington & McGill-Franzen,2010).

I was not surprised of the outcome of the study, mainly because of my own personal

experience with summer reading programs. When it comes to reading and any other activity for

that matter I'm more likely to spend more time doing something that I enjoy or that interests me.

Having students select books that they connect with or have an interest in makes sense and I

wonder why no one has considered this possibility before. The book access factor in the positive

effect it had on the results of the study was also something that I would have expected to happen.

I was however impressed by the comparison they did of their study to the practice of summer

school attendance. Both practices produce similar results in limiting the summer reading setback.

However, Allington & McGill-Franzen’s practice of supplying students selected books proved to

be less expensive. In today's budget driven world, I feel this is a program that should be implemented.