Grade 4 kids in B.C. are top readers

BC Lions’ Geroy Simon spends time reading with his kids Jordan (Right) and Jaden and with wife Tracy at their home in Surrey, B.C., Sept 18, 2012. Photo by Arlen Redekop, The Vancouver Sun

BC Lions’ Geroy Simon spends time reading with his kids Jordan (Right) and Jaden and with wife Tracy at their home in Surrey, B.C., Sept 18, 2012.
Photo by Arlen Redekop, The Vancouver Sun

Adapted from The Vancouver Courier by Nancy Carson
Level 2

Grade 4 students in B.C.
are very good readers.
Nine provinces in Canada
were in a reading study.
There were 45 countries in the same study.

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The reading study
In 2011 there is a study on reading.
About 325,000 students
in the world are in the study.
In Canada, 23,000 students from 1,000 schools
are also in the study.

The study tests reading skills.
It asks students to answer
questions about their reading.
It asks parents about reading with their children.
It asks teachers and school principals
about the reading programs in their schools.

B.C. students
In B.C., 148 schools are in the study.
There are 2,647 Grade 4’s in the study.
Most Grade 4 students in B.C. say they like reading.
Most students say they have good reading skills.
Parents say they do a lot of reading with their children.
Parents do this before their children start school.

Top Readers in the study
The study shows B.C. students
are in the top seven countries
in the world for reading.
The top six countries were Hong Kong,
Russia, Finland, Singapore,
Northern Ireland and the United States.
Out of 45 countries, Canada was 15th in the study.

The magic of words
The B.C. Ministry of Education has a new program
to improve the reading skills of young students.
This program is for kindergarten to Grade 3 students.
The ministry says it now spends more than
$28 million for literacy programs every year.
The Vancouver Sun newspaper is getting
half a million dollars from the province of B.C.
The money is for their Raise-a-Reader program.

 

Ian Oluko, Grade 9 student in Kenya, reads The Westcoast Readerand does the student exercises. Photo by Nancy Carson

Ian Oluko, Grade 9 student in Kenya, reads The Westcoast Reader. He does the student exercises. Photo by Nancy Carson