Poor Attitude to Reading for Pleasure and Its Implications on Acquisition of Language Skills and Academic Achievements: The Case of Students of Secondary Schools in Nigeria

Abstract

The place of reading in the overall intellectual development of man can never be faulted. This is why linguistic scholars have always advocated reading, especially reading for pleasure, in the target language as one of the surest ways of attaining a high level of competence in language skills and excelling in academic achievement. It is based on this background that this paper takes an incisive look at the poor attitude to reading for pleasure as noticed among secondary school students and points out the implications, which among other things include poor communicative competence, poor reading comprehension, lack of creative power, parochial knowledge and poor academic achievement. The paper finally spells out some specific recommendations, which aim at encouraging the students to develop interest in reading for pleasure.