Improving Reading Skills by Encouraging Children to Read: A Randomized Evaluation of the Sa Aklat Sisikat Reading Program in the Philippines

Ama Abeberese, Todd J. Kumler () and Leigh Linden ()
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Todd J. Kumler: Columbia University

No 5812, IZA Discussion Papers from Institute of Labor Economics (IZA)

Abstract: We evaluate a program that aims to improve children's reading skills by providing classes with age-appropriate reading material and incentivizing children to read through a 31 day read-a-thon. During the read-a-thon, the program significantly increases the propensity of children to read, causing 20 percent more children to have read a book in the last week at school and increasing the number of books read by 2.3 in the last week and 7.2 in the last month. These increases extend both after the end of the program and outside of school, although at lower rates. The program also increased students’ scores on a reading assessment, causing students’ scores to improve by 0.13 standard deviations immediately after the program. The effect persisted even after the program ended with an effect of 0.06 standard deviations three months later.

Keywords: education; reading; development (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I21 I28 O15 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 36 pages
Date: 2011-06
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-lab
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (6)

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Working Paper: Improving Reading Skills by Encouraging Children to Read: A Randomized Evaluation of the Sa Aklat Sisikat Reading Program in the Philippines (2011)
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