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Further to the extrinsic reward business--

Certainly I agree with the idea that extrinsic rewards have
drawbacks.  My own cautionary tale suggests as much.  But schools are
desperate and have no other way of reaching inot the home to encourage
a reading environment (except by assigning book reports etc, which
would likely do even more harm than good.)

I wonder whether there is any research to suggest that a fairly well
thought out program to encourage family reading actually does more
harm than good.  Of course it looks bad if you compare it with
spontaneous reading, but is it better than no reading at all?  Does it
actually discourage children who might otherwise have been spontaneous
readers?

Doug