Chapter 1
Introduction

Background of the Study
In the world of reading, our interest is one of the most salient factor that needs to be consider. It depends on the reasons why we read a certain material. We read because we are force to do so, for school requirements or we read we like it. If we like to read, reading materials matters most. Among the four macro skills in learning, Reading is the most important that a person needs to acquire because it is a vehicle that can be used to know and discover the world of learning and experiences.
Reading defined as the process of decoding the printed materials. It is the very important aspect in education. It is basic tool of all subject areas. As stated by Santiago (2003) of Department of Education, National Capital Region. Reading is the mother of all skills. Reading is one of the myriad vehicles that provide readers with opportunities to anchor their spaceship of eagerness and interests – to know and discover the secrets behind the wonderful planet of vision and ideas. (Violesa S. Adrian)
However, students nowadays, reading is taken for granted. They access to almost anything electronic such that old habits like playing street games or even reading have almost gone extinct. And one important educational issue is to increase the amount of interesting reading that students engage in. The bulk of the research in this area examined text characteristics that contribute to making reading materials more interesting.
Gregg Schraw and R. S. Dennison proposed that reading for information that was central to an activated schema would increase the interestingness of schema-relevant information. In the context, the phenomenon of text information appearing to be more interesting to one group of readers than another was referred to as purpose-driven interest. This view holds that schema-relevant information becomes interesting because it is central to the reader's adopted purpose for reading (cf. Hidi etal.,1992;Lave &Wenger,1991;Rosenblatt,1983)
Roger Schank indicated that certain concepts (e.g., death, violence, and sex) can be considered "absolute interests" that almost universally elicit individuals' interest. Furthermore, Text-based interest can also be promoted by altering certain aspects of the learning environment such as modifying task presentations, curriculum materials, and individuals' self-regulation.

In United States, it has been estimated that one out of five adults lack the basic reading skills they need to function daily, while 13% of all 17 years olds are functionally illiterate.(Nancy T. Ramirez) Libraries have a very important function, which is to provide opportunities for development of reading interests through making materials accessible to readers. The UK National Literacy Trust has done some interesting research on how young people feel about themselves as readers. Existing research has already shown that the way “an individual feels about him or herself as a reader could clearly influence whether reading would be sought or avoided”. Taking this into account the NLT research investigated influences on children’s perceptions of themselves as readers. Looking at family, peer groups and the school, the research looked into the materials pupils were reading, as well as assessing which materials pupils felt they were encouraged to read.

A survey conducted in 2005 revealed that Singaporeans spent most of their leisure time at home watching television and listening to radio (Ngian & Manoo, 2005). Only half of those surveyed enjoyed reading. The top reasons for reading were knowledge, work/study and hobbies. Attitude towards learning was positive, and choices included books, magazines and newspapers. A nation-wide reading campaign, Read! Singapore, was inaugurated in 2005 to encourage leisure reading especially among working professionals, otherwise Known as the ‘missing generation’ from the libraries (National Library Board of Singapore, 2005) In the Philippines, The Department of Education (DepEd) is hoping to bring back the interest of school children in reading instead of them spending too much time on the Internet. DepEd has declared November as the National Reading Month and has urged schools and learning institutions to conduct a month-long reading program to revive the youth’s interest in the printed word. In a memorandum issued, Education Secretary Armin Luistro ordered school officials to conduct various reading activities in schools and other learning facilities, among them a Read-a-Thon, “Drop Everything and Read (Dear)” and remedial reading classes for children. The program is part of DepEd’s move to institutionalize the national “Every Child a Reader” program, in the Memorandum No. 244.
DepEd is initiating programs that would promote reading and literacy among the pupils and students motivate our youth to learn from the lives and works of eminent Filipinos, uphold one’s own heritage and values and make reading a shared physical experience. Among activities DepEd lined up for November are the Read-a-Thon, which aims to discover outstanding readers in class; the Dear program, which engages students in 15 to 20 minutes of reading daily; and the shared reading or readers’ mentoring program, where older students are encouraged to assist younger readers with reading difficulties.
In Davao City, Mayor Inday Sarah Duterte conducted a program entitled “MAGBASA TA” (Programa ni Mayor Inday Para sa Barangay) As of CY:2013. It aims to look for creative ways to promote reading and make the library resources and services to as many users as possible. There is also the need to build a community of readers to allow them to interact and share whatever resources are at their disposal. Furthermore, the burden of responsibility to achieve a culture of reading involves the whole community; however the family environment plays a crucial role in encouraging and nurturing a child’s interest to read. Realizing this need, the City library aims to reach out to families as partners in creating a culture and environment for developing such a habit.
In August 2009, a global direct-selling company invested on an educational campaign named "One-by-One Campaign for Children" which intends to perk and maintain students' interest in reading. Although actions are made to address this recurring problem, the technology the generation has to offer is a continuous enemy in the attempt to retain students' interest in books. Because after all who would prefer carrying heavy books and leafing through its pages over simply typing key words and pasting it in one click.
Modern technology helps a lot in today's educational system but it also has an alarming effect on the reading habits and efficiency of the youth today. Not only does it make students lazy and unimaginative, it also hinders them from enhancing one of the basic skills that they have to learn. Reading is a very important part of the learning process and if the diminishing efficiency for this skill continues, the country can yet hit another illiteracy dilemma. Our young youths nowadays are really fascinated with technologies which affects their reading interest. Fortunately, there are still who really entice with books or to any printed materials. However, it matters on the kind of reading materials.

Statement of the Problem
The purpose of this study is to determine if the reading materials influence the reading interest of the BSED students of SPCT.
Specifically, this research answers the following questions:
a.What are the different reading materials used for information purpose?
b.What are the different reading materials used for delight?
c.Which of the materials that the BSED students mostly preferred to read?
d.What are the factors that influence the BSED student’s choice of reading materials to read?
Significance of the Study
The significance of this study are; First, it enables the student of SPCT in College Education Department to ignite their reading interest. Second, it enables other readers to realize the importance of reading in our lives. Third, readers would come into conclusion that reading in not just for leisure but a tool for learning. Last, they would be able to differentiate books for factual information and the book for leisure.

Scope and Limitation of the study
This study involves 50 selected BSED/BEED students of SPCT school year 2014-2015.

Definition of Terms
1. Interest - something that concerns, involves, draws the attention of, or arouses the curiosity of a person
2. Materials - anything that serves as crude or raw matter to be used or developed
3. Fiction - something feigned, invented, or imagined; a made-up story
4. Non-fiction - the branch of literature comprising works of narrative prose dealing with or offering opinions or conjectures upon facts and reality.
5. Books - a handwritten or printed work of fiction or nonfiction, usually on sheets of paper fastened or bound together within covers.
6. magazines - a publication that is issued periodically, usually bound in a paper cover, and typically contains essays, stories, poems, etc.,
7. newspaper- a publication issued at regular and usually close intervals, especially daily or weekly, and commonly containing news comment, features, and advertising.
8. Comics- pertaining to, or characterized by comedy
9. Delight - a high degree of pleasure or enjoyment; joy; rapture
10. Novel - a fictitious prose narrative of considerable length and complexity, portraying characters and usually presenting a sequential organization of action and scenes.
11. Journals - a periodical or magazine, especially one published for a special group, learned society, or profession

READING MATERIALS AND READING INTEREST
OF THE BSED STUDENTS IN SPCT
__________________________________________________________
A Research Paper
Presented to
Mr. Felix Reconalla
Saint Peter's College of Toril
Toril, Davao City
__________________________________________________________

In Partial Fulfilment of the Requirements
For Educ.12 (Educational Research)
A.Y. 2014-2015
__________________________________________________________

By
ROSALYN DELIMA ARAIZ

Chapter 2: Review of Related Literature

Elliott et al. (1979) scompared the reading interests of a group of students in an urban, vocational–technical high school and those of a group of students in a suburban comprehension high school. The urban vocational school students were found to be more interested in poetry more than the suburban comprehension high school. There were also clear sex differences in the reading interests which in turn did not vary according to grade level. In addition, there was a strong interest in newspaper reading among the students.

Al-Kutob (1981) investigated the attitudes and motivations of Kuwaiti young people towards reading and their reading interests. The findings revealed that the most popular printed materials were Arabic newspapers, magazines and books. The findings also indicated that the most popular subjects among the participants were religion, literature, art and social issues, while science, economics and politics were the least popular. He also found that female and male participants differed in their choices of reading materials.

Johns (1987) surveyed the most popular titles among third, fourth and fifth grade students. The findings showed that the largest number of books were selected from two categories: mystery and science and technology, but fewer numbers of books were selected from the categories of historical fiction, poetry and war. Furthermore, 27 titles were selected most often from the following categories: realistic fiction, science and technology, mystery, sports, humorous fiction, poetry, biography, history, information and fantasy.

Roberts (1987) investigated the effects of topic interest on reading comprehension after covering the effects of prior knowledge. The findings revealed that the topic interest was a statically significant predictor on two of the five passages used in this study. The findings also showed that boys were more influenced by their reading interests than girls with respect to comprehension.

Lau and Cheung (1988) studied the relationship of the interests of Chinese students to their introversion, intellectualism and academic achievement. They also studied the influence of reading interests of their family members and peers. They found that the more introverted students were interested in literary materials, while the less introverted ones were interested in action type of materials. In addition, they found that students high in the value of academic achievement were interested in literary and academic materials. Furthermore, the findings revealed that students with parents, siblings, classmates and friends who read tended to have wider reading interests.

Campbell (1990) examined the relationship between reading interests and achievement of male disabled readers. The findings of the study showed that there was a relationship between reading interests and reading achievement.

Cowin (1991) analyzed the reading preferences of fifth grade students who involved in a self-selective literature based reading program. She also examined books freely chosen by children and their comments on them to determine the reasons why they select those books. She found that there were recurring elements of appeal in texts, but these elements did not limit the reader to any specific genre or topic and they can be affected in many different ways. Cowin concluded that children’s own reading interests should be taken into account and provisions should be made to meet them and they should have access to many books from which they can choose.

Whittemore (1992) surveyed the reading interests of high school senior and sophomore students. The findings revealed that horror was the favourite type of novel; the favourite author was Stephen king; the favourite magazines were “Seventeen” and “Sport Illustration”; and the favourite type of literature was short story. A significant relationship was found between reading frequency and gender, but there was not a relationship between parents’ reading frequency and students’ reading frequency.

Fronius (1993) investigated the reading interests of young adult participants in the summer reading program at Medina County District Library, Ohio. It was found that the favourite categories were realistic fiction and mystery/suspense. The findings also indicated that the favourite authors were R.L. Stine, Francine Pascal, Ann M. Martin, Christopher Pike, Carolyn Keene, Stephen King and Lurlene McDaniel, but these seven authors were not found to be on “Best Book” lists.

Busch (1994) investigated the reading interests and information needs of a German ethnic minority group in Australia. The findings showed that there were significant differences due to gender. Males preferred magazines, newspapers, and books of history, literature and adventure, while females showed preference to books of cookery, literature and history. In general, respondents were interested in pamphlets, technical information, poetry and letters.

Bachmutskaya and Yankova (1996) investigated Russian young people’s reading interests. The findings of the study indicated that boys and girls had growing interest in questions of democracy, humanism, history and interpersonal communication.

Diaz (1996) investigated the reading genre preferences of high school students in Pennsylvania. The findings revealed that the top 10 areas of interests were adventure, horror mysteries, humor, murder, love, fantasy, crime, sports and movies. When comparing these findings with those of studies conducted 10 years earlier, there was found a substantial change in reading interests.

Gourlie (1996) investigated the reading interests and preferences of older adult public library users in Oakwood, Ohio community. She also attempted to discover on large print materials with this group. The findings indicated that the majority of readers showed a preference for standard print materials over large type materials. Moreover, women showed a stronger interest in large type materials with increasing age. In addition, she found that all ages use large print collection. She concluded that regular and large print collection should take into account the interests of all ages.

Reynolds (1996) investigated English young people’s reading interests and habits. The findings indicated that in the youngest age groups of 4 and 7 most children chose a book by illustrations, or its cover; the 11 and 14 year olds chose a book by its cover, title, blurb or name of the author. The most popular authors were Ronald Dahl and Quentin Black. The findings also indicated that the more girls than boys read fiction more than 3 h per a week.
Robinson (1998) investigated the reading interests and habits of Jamaican sixth grade students. Robinson also tried to identify the types of books they are interested in and their preferences for books with Eurocentric or Afrocentric main characters. The findings showed that sex was the most powerful factor in determining the reading interests, while the geographical and academic performance were the least. Race also affected book choices as the majority of students preferred books with Afrocentric heroes. In addition, brighter students tended to read a greater number of books than others.

Gallik (1999) investigated the recreational reading interests of college students. The findings of the study revealed that students were interested in magazines, letters/e-mail chat, internet, newspapers, novels, non-fiction books, poetry, comic books, mysteries, horror novels, biographies and religious/spiritual materials.

Worthy et al. (1999) investigated the reading interests of an ethnically and economically diverse group of sixth grade students. The study showed that light materials, such a scary series books, comics and magazines top the list for every subgroup of students.

Meehan (1999) investigated the reading interests and habits of teenagers. They found that 66% of the respondents read magazines, 59% read newspapers; and 48% read the backs of cereal boxes or other packages. They also found that their favourite genres are mysteries, adventure, horror, and true stories. Moreover, it was found that the favourite books are classics, bestsellers, and young adult novels. Finally, they found that the teenagers read for pleasure, personal satisfaction, and for study purposes.

Bernt et al. (2000) investigated how well editors can predict readers’ reading of other studies conducted on 10 interests. The subjects were provided with 11 categories including religion, health issues, business, young people, older people, the stock markets, local schools, local crimes, high school sports, governor Taft and Ohio legislature. There was found a high public interest in local health, local schools, and young people. They also found that the majority of editors anticipated correctly that readers were interested in these kinds of news.

Machet (2001) examined the reading interests of young people at the end of the 20th century. Machet also attempted to discern conventional forms of reading (printed matters) and new developments in the presentation of the interactions with text including audio tapes, CD-ROMs and internet. The study showed that children aged between 7 and 11 were highly interested in reading religious books. The findings also indicated that children showed a relative lack of interest in comics.

Hunt (2002) investigated the attitudes, interests and the level of response to young adult novels and classical novels in high school English class. The study revealed that students showed a better attitude and higher interests in young adult novels in contrast to classical novels. The study also showed that students’ level of response to novels was affected by theme, characters, setting, language and style of the novels.

The National Literacy Trust (2003) surveyed East Midlands library users’ reading choices. It was found that they like to read science fiction/fantasy, family sagas, non-fiction, romance fiction, crime fiction, literary fiction, war/spy/adventure books. It was also found that the major factors which influence their choice in library books are display in the library, friend recommendations, newspaper/magazine/TV review, return trolley, books seen in a bookshop, current events, prize winners and the internet.

Yusko (2003) analyzed the reading interests of 7–13 years old boys. She found that animals, science and sports are popular across all ages, while interest in computers and biography increases as age increases. She also found that there is a marked interest in non-fiction.

Al-Jurf (2004) found that 77% of Saudi female university students read light women magazines on topics promoted by satellite stations, which, she claimed, is part of an attempt to “trivialize young people’s literacy and distract them from national issues”.

Al-Shorman and Bataineh (2004) investigated the reading interests of state and private university EFL senior students reading interests in the northern region of Jordan. They found that the students have a wide range of interests, the top 10 of which are short stories, women magazines, novels, magazines about religion, adventure books, picture magazines, newspapers, world events, books about religion, romantic magazines and fashion magazines. They also found that students dislike reading economics books.

Bataineh and Al-Barakat (2005) studied the first-, second-, and third-grade pupils’ reading interests, source of reading materials, and whether or not these pupils have a positive attitude toward reading. They found that stories and picture books/magazines top pupils’ reading interests. They also found that the school library is their major source of reading materials. Further, the pupils were found to have a positive attitude towards reading. Moreover, lack of incentives and excessive school homework were perceived as the major obstacles hindering the pupils’ literacy development.

Al-Shorman and Bataineh (2005) investigated the top reading interests of upper basic stage students in their native language, the potential effects of gender, class level and school type, and the potential relationship between their perceptions of the importance of reading and those of their parents, siblings, teachers, and peers. They found that internet materials, sports magazines, mystery books/magazines and fairy tales top reading interests. Effects were also detected for gender, class level and school type. Furthermore, they found a significant relationship between the respondents’ views on the importance of reading and those of their siblings and teachers, while home libraries and peers were repeatedly major sources of reading materials. Finally, it was found that the majority of the participants claimed to be reading out of obligation rather than of a desire to do so, which was further supported by their claims of reading mainly for school-related purposes.

Borja (2007) did a survey on the reading interests and habits of 119 freshmen students at the University of the Philippines Diliman who were taking up English classes on the second semester of academic year 2006-2007. The study was done in the context of the effects of pleasure reading on the students’ performance in their classes. The survey revealed that respondents stated that the library’s collections meet their pleasure reading needs and that the library is conducive to studying. However, they seldom do pleasure reading although they indicate that the materials they read for pleasure help them in their English classes. The materials they prefer most are fiction of which bestsellers is the favored subgenre. They mostly borrow these materials according to frequency: textbooks/reference books, journals, newspapers, multimedia resources, and novels. The results also indicated that the most common reason for using the library was for academic purposes such as doing research and homework; pleasure reading was their last priority.

Theory Base
Day and Bamford (1980) put forward ten characteristics identified in successful Extensive Reading Programs. They are duplicated (in abbreviated form) below:
1.Students read as much as possible.
2.A variety of materials on a range of topics is available.
3.Students select what they want to read .
4.The purposes of reading are usually related to pleasure, information and general understanding.
5.Reading is its own reward.
6.Reading materials are well within the linguistic competence of the students in terms of vocabulary and grammar.
7.Reading is individual and silent.
8.Reading speed is usually faster than slower.
9.Teachers orient students to the goals of the program.
10.The teacher is a role model of a reader for the students.