annecater
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Joined: 12 Aug 2006
Posts: 1629
Location: Lincolnshire
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 Posted: Wed Jan 07, 2009 9:27 am Post subject: Action-packed book series designed to encourage boys to read |
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Research suggests that 21 per cent of nine-year-old boys are not interested in books, compared with 13 per cent of girls.
At the age of seven, boys lag behind girls in reading performance by eight percentage points and 46 per cent said they only read because they had to, compared with a quarter of girls.
Now Oxford University Press has created a "reading tree", a series of books that increase in difficulty but keep the same characters, specifically for primary school-aged boys.
Project X tells the story of four friends, Max, Ant, Tiger and Cat, who try to stop dangerous scientist Dr Evil from shrinking the world.
The books have fast-moving plots, plenty of computer-generated images and have storylines based around teamwork – shown to appeal most to boys.
Sophie Quarterman, of the Oxford University Press, said: "All the research shows us that girls read because they are told to and will read anything put in front of them. But boys need to be given a reason to read. They need to feel they will get something out of it."
Boys are often attracted to non-fiction, so each group of books in the Project X series is accompanied by a book full of facts and diagrams.
One, on ants, suggests that if you weighed all the ants in the world they would weigh about as much as all the human beings in the world.
Another explains all about pirate ships and includes a recipe for ships' biscuits.
Miss Quarterman said: "The teaching notes contain lots of activities, such as things for boys to make and do with their hands."
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Currently reading: The Tent The Bucket and Me by Emma Kennedy and Granny The Pag by Nina Bawden
1001 Challenge Books read in 2009 - 3
1001 Challenge Books read in 2008 - 8
1001 Challenge Books read in 2007 - 13 |
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