It is estimated that writing began about 5,500 years ago on clay tablets in Mesopotamia. People have been reading ever since and in ever increasing numbers. The act of quantifying the quality of student learning through grades probably began in the late 1700s. Teachers and students have struggled with the process ever since. But one thing is certain: The ability to read well makes it easier to get good grades.
Strong independent reading skills help students to absorb and analyze large amounts of information in academic subjects such as literature, math, science and social studies. These days, students are increasingly expected to read and take write in all their classes, including physical education. Literacy Matters, an online education resource, notes that in math, students must "make sense of the technical vocabulary, complex information, and detailed directions contained in textbooks, articles, and documents such as graphs and charts."
Educators used to say that "learning to read" shifted to "reading to learn" in sixth grade. Now the Annie E. Casey Foundation, which focuses on education has published a study stating that children need to be able to read to learn in content-area subjects by the fourth grade. The Foundation says, "Children who read on grade level by the end of third grade are more successful in school, work, and in life."
Most people would say it is obvious that you have to read well to get good grades in literature classes. But what about science? Literacy Matters points out that in addition to textbooks, students need to read lab directions, reports about experiments, case studies and scientific reports. To succeed in social studies, it says, students must be able to absorb specialized vocabulary, identify key ideas and determine what is fact versus opinion.
It doesn't matter how well you read if you don't do the reading. Mission College, located in California's high tech Silicon Valley, offers some solid advice on how to read a math textbook. But the college notes, "Before you attempt homework problems, it is important that you carefully read the relevant sections of your math textbook." Similarly, little progress is made by capable readers at the elementary level if they attempt their work without reading the text.
Students can also earn better grades if they understand that different texts require different kinds of reading. Fiction is more relaxing than a math text because it requires less concentration. Arizona's Pima Community College says to slow down when reading a math text, adding "the flow of a math book is not like the flow of a novel." Both Mission and Pima colleges indicate students need to take responsibility for their understanding through strategies such as rereading, taking notes about what they don't understand, and looking up unfamiliar words.