by Margaret K. Merga, London, Facet Publishing, 2023, 222 pp., $88.50 (soft cover), ISBN: 978-1-78330-638-1 (Review by Catherine Ryan)
This new publication from Margaret Merga is a timely and essential manual for anyone wanting to create or reinvigorate the reading culture in schools. Reading is a skill about which schools cannot afford to be complacent. This book directly addresses this issue by providing a practical research framed guide for teachers, librarians and principals.
Merga has provided a comprehensive framework for her arguments, including her own research study WASCBR (2016 West Australian Study in Children’s Book Reading project: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/eie.12143). She cites studies from Australia and around the world to inform her argument that reading is a transformative experience and essential life skill which schools need to take on, like any other curriculum program.
The structure of the book looks at the ‘Why?’ but translates this research into the ‘How?’, recognising that the current environment in schools is one in which school library staffing is being reduced, library collections are being cut and budgets diminished. Where global funding may be diverted to multi-use spaces or specialist programs rather than libraries, then framing the argument for why this is important and engaging all stakeholders including teachers, principals, curriculum leaders and parents is critical.
Merga directly refers to ‘competent leaders of change’ and addresses what attributes such leaders require. She discusses key stakeholders and argues that programs need to be owned collectively with distributed responsibility, not all falling to library staff. This means that the program is owned by the whole school and not seen as a fringe project of the library staff. Thus leadership is seen as key in setting up an effective project. This is considered so important that a whole section is given over to leadership traits vital to the success of a good project.
Practical instructions are given about program setup and strategies for a clear and workable plan and viable goal-setting. Likewise she elaborates on evaluation of programs including surveys. She also covers getting quality data from students and reporting on results.
This book is essential because those setting up programs need research to back their arguments with stakeholders and Merga will be the benchmark for some years. Her reference list brings together the current data on everything including reading by gender (yes, boys do read), graphic novels and eBooks versus paper books. She implores users to publish, seek academic partnerships and add to the miniscule amount of useful research out there.
This book is the must-have for school librarians, teachers and principals wanting to change the reading culture. At a time when the ‘How’ we teach reading is being debated at curriculum level, the idea of reading as a pleasurable life-skill needs to be discussed. Merga has both set the challenge and provided a useful framework.
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