The Impact of Middle School Teachers' Personal Reading Habits on Their Literacy Instruction

Abstract

All educators, regardless of subject or grade level taught, are expected to incorporate literacy best practices into their classroom (Huang, 2017). They are also expected to inspire their students to be lifelong readers which can be problematic when teachers do not have positive personal reading habits (Nathanson, et al., 2008). Based on this understanding, this empirical study sought to answer the question: what is the impact of core middle school teachers’ personal reading habits on their classroom literacy practices? Participants consisted of nine middle school teachers. The study used an online survey tool and resulted in three main findings. First, there was no clear connection between the participant’s personal reading habits and their use of literacy best practices in the classroom. Second, the participants mainly valued reading but were not frequent readers themselves. Third, within the qualitative data, there was no connection between the participant’s reading habits and their use of best practices as they value a variety of best practices with an emphasis on more “non-social” strategies. In conclusion, the lack of reading habits of the middle school teachers surveyed did not impact their use of literacy best practices in the classroom.