Discussion

According to Lazarus and Callahan (2005), students’ attitude toward reading was expected to decline as students progressed through grade levels. In our study of School A, we found that our results conflicted somewhat with those of the national studies. School A showed an unusual pattern for both students receiving AIS instruction, and those who did not. Students with AIS instruction were expected to decline in reading attitudes as they grew older, but instead, at School A the students’ attitudes actually slightly increased. This could be contributed to the teachers at the school, or the AIS program and services provided to different grade levels. When looking at student attitudes for those students not under AIS instruction, the trend between grades one and two followed the pattern that Lazarus and Callahan had found. Student attitudes became more negative towards reading overall between grades one and two. Grade three defied the findings of Lazarus and Callahan (2005), and student attitude became much more positive in grade three. With these findings, one has to wonder if the pattern from School A is based on the type of program, student community, or what factors play into the differences between them and School B. We would also have to look at the training of the AIS providers in each building, as well as the outside influences such as tutoring or instruction and practice with reading at home. If we are going so far as to look at outside influences, we should also wonder if parents or siblings are avid readers at home, and what perceptions the guardians in each home give to their children toward learning and reading.
In contrast to what McKenna, Kear, and Ellsworth (1995) found, the full scale reading attitudes of students from School B increased from first through third grade. The recreational attitude of these students increased across grade levels as well, while the academic reading attitude increased from first to second grade and decreased from second to third grade. While the whole class data differs from McKenna, Kear, and Ellsworth’s (1995) finding, when we look more closely at the students who receive AIS and those who do not, the data aligns with the previous research. Students who have lower reading ability and receive AIS instruction had much lower attitude scores than their peers who did not participate in the AIS program. This is what we expected to find due to the fact that the students with lower reading ability would encounter more frustrating reading experiences during their schooling.
At both schools, students receiving AIS instruction had lower scores than their counterparts, with the exception of second grade in School A. Although the AIS students’ scores at School A did have a slight increase across grades one through three, their scores remained significantly lower than students who did not receive services. Both School A and School B follow the pattern that students receiving AIS instruction generally have a more negative view toward reading. As McKenna, Kear, and Ellsworth (1995) found, reading ability strongly correlates with reading attitude. This is probably because the more frustrating experiences a child encounters with reading, the more their attitude toward reading declines. Students of average to high reading ability encounter minimal frustrating experiences their peers who receive AIS for reading tend to encounter many more frustrating experiences in reading.
It is interesting to note the differences we found in our study as compared to the national survey McKenna et al. (1995) conducted. While their results showed significant drops in reading attitude as students progressed from grades one through six (McKenna et al., 1995), our study found the opposite. Both schools in the study saw increases in their students’ reading attitudes from grades one through three. Of course, this study was conducted with a limited sample size, which may affect the findings, but it is encouraging nonetheless. The positive attitudes may correlate with the teachers’ views of the AIS programs in these two schools as well. The teachers had very positive feelings about the way their intervention services are implemented, only wishing they had more time to spend with the lower ability reading students. One must take into consideration the effect a teachers’ attitude can have on students.
Additionally, teacher questionnaires gave us a great insight into how the programs work within each building. Although the programs are similar, they are not completely identical, which could cause for differences in attitudes and results by students. While School A uses many TA’s along with the AIS instructors in order to provide services, School B relies on their Special Education instructors to aid AIS providers in performing the necessary duties. Teachers throughout both schools expressed the wish that more services were available for their lowest achieving students, but were aware that it was not a realistic possibility. It was also found between schools that students receiving services were less likely to show enthusiasm toward reading within the general classroom than their Non-AIS receiving peers which correlates with the student scores on the ERAS.