Why I decided to slow down our reading in IB English B
We keep hearing that young people aren’t reading enough. According to the National Literacy Trust (2026), just 36.1% of 8–18-year-olds in the UK enjoy reading in their free time, and only 20.3% read daily. Both figures have recovered slightly from 2025, but remain well below earlier levels.
Meanwhile, research suggests that reading can improve writing. A meta-analysis by Graham and colleagues (2018) found that reading interventions, including increased engagement with texts, had positive effects on students’ writing.
So I’ve been trying to get my IB English B students reading more. But I’ve discovered that quantity might not be the whole answer.
Reading Together
My initial idea was straightforward. Every week, students selected an authentic English text that interested them, whether a news article, opinion piece, blog, speech or review.
They added it to a shared Google Slides presentation, highlighting interesting vocabulary, rhetorical techniques, text-type conventions and connections to our IB themes.
I did the homework too.
Partly, I wanted to model effective annotation. More importantly, I wanted students to see that I genuinely enjoy reading. If I encounter a clever expression, a provocative argument or an unexpectedly funny paragraph, I want to share it.
I think it’s important that students see their teachers enjoying the things we encourage them to do.
The routine was going reasonably well. We were accumulating an interesting collection of texts covering everything from extreme sports to climate change and artificial intelligence.
But something began to bother me.
Reading and Forgetting
Every week, we found something new, annotated it and moved on.
What happened to that wonderful expression from two weeks ago? That interesting argument someone had discovered? Were students remembering any of it?
And although we’d built a shared collection, students weren’t necessarily engaging much with one another’s choices.
I began to feel that we were reading too much, too quickly, and not giving the texts enough opportunity to affect us.
Perhaps we needed to read a little less, but do more with what we’d read.
Week B: Compare or Create
My response was to introduce a two-week cycle.
Week A: Read and Analyse. Students select an authentic text and explore its vocabulary, message, audience, purpose and language choices. We’re particularly interested in why writers make those choices, not simply identifying rhetorical devices.
Week B: Connect and Apply. Instead of finding something new, students revisit our collection, including texts chosen by classmates.
They have two options:
- Compare: Explore an interesting connection or contrast between two texts, considering ideas, perspectives or writing techniques.
- Create: Produce an original text inspired by the ideas or techniques they’ve encountered.
The intention is simple: give reading a chance to influence their own thinking and writing.
Our first attempts have been revealing. Every DP2 student who completed Week B chose Compare rather than Create! Some made fascinating connections, including one comparing fear in extreme sports and solo hiking. Others stayed rather close to the surface.
So I’ve already made an adjustment: students will alternate between Compare and Create in successive Week B tasks.
It’s very much a work in progress.
More than Just Reading
What I particularly like is how the routine connects several aspects of IB English B.
Students develop vocabulary and comprehension for Paper 2, encounter authentic models of text types and effective writing for Paper 1, and practise analysing how writers communicate meaning.
Perhaps just as importantly, they build a store of ideas and examples for Part 3 of the Individual Oral, where discussion often depends on making connections to broader course themes.
After all, sometimes students struggle to express an opinion not because they lack the English, but because they haven’t got enough to say.
The shared collection gives them access to far more than their own reading choices.
Letting Reading Stay with Us
I started the routine because I wanted students to read more. Week B emerged when I realised that moving quickly from one text to another wasn’t necessarily helping students remember or use what they’d encountered.
I don’t yet know whether this approach will improve their examination results or their long-term reading habits. But it’s already encouraging us to return to ideas, make connections and experiment with language.
And I’ll keep doing the homework myself, partly to model good reading, but mainly because I enjoy it.
Perhaps the aim shouldn’t simply be to get students reading more, but to help more of what they read stay with them.
References
National Literacy Trust (2026). Children and young people’s reading in 2026.
Graham, S., et al. (2018). Reading for Writing: A Meta-Analysis of the Impact of Reading Interventions on Writing. Review of Educational Research, 88(2), 243–284.
Leave a Reply