Exploring the reading attitudes of fourth grade Orthodox Jewish girls educated in a private elementary school

Many research studies exist on reading strategies that improve student achievement in reading, yet few studies focus on student attitudes toward reading or describe how student attitudes affect reading behaviors. There are studies that focus on gender in relation to reading attitudes, yet there is a dearth of studies that explore the attitudes of Orthodox Jewish girls toward reading. Therefore, this grounded theory study describes how student-reading attitudes develop and delineates the behaviors of Orthodox Jewish girls with positive reading attitudes who are educated in private elementary schools on the East Coast. The research of Thorndike, Skinner, and Piaget as well as Bandura's self-efficacy theory in relation to academic achievement also supports this study because these theorists explain how the environment influences student actions and desire to learn. In order to identify student-reading attitudes, the students were given the Elementary Reading Attitude Survey. An open-ended questionnaire guided an oral interview that explored how student-reading attitudes develop. Qualitative data were collected until the point of data saturation, which occurred after eight weeks. Data analysis incorporated open, axial, and selective coding to inform the creation of a model that accounts for the development of reading attitudes in Orthodox Jewish girls. The findings indicate that positive literacy experiences in school and at home, and engaging peers in literacy discussions contribute to the development of positive reading attitudes. In terms of educational change, this study provides relevant findings on how the attitudes of Orthodox Jewish girls who are educated in a private school setting are shaped and may be useful to other cultures and ethnicities as well as public schools in deciding what instructional strategies encourage positive attitudes towards reading in young girls.