Choice

Students are given opportunities to exercise decision-making with regard to open literacy activities and tasks.

• “Students can select from a variety of tasks appropriate for their learning needs and interests.” (Turner & Paris, 1995, p.664)

• “When students can choose tasks and texts they are interested in, they expend more effort learning and understanding the material.” (Schiefele, 1991, as cited by Turner & Paris, 1995, p.664)

• “When students are allowed to select the tasks that have personal value, they are more likely to use learning strategies like summarizing or backtracking rather than shortcuts like memorizing, copying, or guessing.”(Turner & Paris, 1995, p.664)

• Turner and Paris (1995) stated that during the study they conducted, “students…who were allowed to choose among activities and who had options about how to organize and plan showed more personal responsibility for their literacy learning because the activities themselves required such behaviors.” (p. 665)

• Teachers can support students’ ability to make choices during literacy instruction in the following ways:
• "Encourage students to make personal choices." (ibid.)
• "Demonstrate to students that literacy means pursuing personal aesthetic and informational goals." (ibid.)
•  Students choose what books they will read.  (ibid.)
• “Students take responsibility for evaluating texts to set new reading goals.” (ibid.)

Reference: 

Turner, J., & Paris, S. (1995). How literacy tasks influence children's motivation for literacy.The Reading Teacher,48(8), 662-673.

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