How to kick-start reading in Australian classrooms

IN Partnership with

A new Renaissance-commissioned survey of 508 Australian teachers reveals how targeted literacy technology can help turn reading from a reluctant chore back into a habit students choose for themselves

ONCE, a good book could power its own feedback loop for students. A reader finished a chapter and wanted the next hit. Now, many kids treat reading like starting a cold engine on a winter morning, all grind and no momentum, while their phones idle at full throttle in the background. For a growing number of Australian students, the real problem is not whether they can read but whether reading still feels worth choosing. The self-propelled reward that used to come from getting lost in a book has stalled. What many classrooms need is a clean running start to get that engine turning again, and that is the space Renaissance is trying to fill.

Renaissance is a global leader in pre-K–12 educational technology, supporting schools across Australia and New Zealand with research-backed assessments and reading programs designed for real classrooms. Our solutions span literacy practice and engagement, cognitive and academic assessments, wellbeing and attitude surveys, and early identification screening – giving educators a clear picture of where every student is and what they need next. We work with schools from early years through to secondary, combining data-driven insight with teacher expertise to accelerate learning for all students, regardless of ability, background or circumstance.

Find out more

“Australian schools don’t have a reading problem caused by a lack of effort from teachers. They have an engagement and insight problem”

Kate McGrath, Renaissance

According to a new YouGov survey of 508 Australian teachers, commissioned by education technology company Renaissance in April 2026, almost all say students at their school face reading challenges, with disengagement, limited home reading and a lack of visibility into progress turning reading into a chore instead of a daily habit. “Australian schools don’t have a reading problem caused by a lack of effort from teachers,” says Kate McGrath, country manager ANZ for Renaissance. “They have an engagement and insight problem.” The survey findings show how wide and deep that problem has become. This issue is not a few reluctant readers tucked away at the back of the room. When 98% of teachers say students are disengaged from reading for one reason or another and 79% say disengagement is already a problem in their classroom, something structural is happening. And teachers are largely being left to manage it on their own. The home–school reading gap nobody owns Perhaps the most sobering statistic in the survey is this: every teacher surveyed, all 100%, identified significant barriers to students reading regularly at home. Screen time and devices topped the list at 77%, followed by parents not prioritising or encouraging reading at 71% and students simply lacking motivation to read outside school at 67%. McGrath says the findings point to a growing challenge around how responsibility for reading habits is shared between schools and families. Nearly half of teachers, 47%, say reading at home should be primarily a parental responsibility, while another 49% believe it should be shared between schools and families. Schools are increasingly being asked to support reading habits beyond the classroom, often without clear visibility into what reading looks like at home.

There is a sharp contradiction at the heart of this. A substantial majority of teachers, 82%, say they feel equipped to encourage a daily reading habit in their students. Yet fewer than half, 46%, believe their students are actually reading for 15 minutes a day outside school. Intent, systems and outcomes are pulling in different directions. The home monitoring challenge is not only logistical. “With 83% of teachers saying that difficulty monitoring reading at home is a significant barrier to improving outcomes and 21% citing a lack of an easy way for students to access books digitally at home, myON becomes not just an engagement tool but a genuine equity solution,” says McGrath. “If reading can only happen at school, we’ve already lost a significant portion of the hours that drive reading growth.”

Access matters because reading habits do not stop at the school gate. In the survey, 39% of teachers identified lack of access to books at home as a barrier to reading growth, while 81% agreed that digital or e-books can help engage students who resist traditional formats. Renaissance’s digital reading platform, myON, is designed around that challenge, giving students access to books across devices at school and at home. For schools trying to extend reading beyond classroom hours, digital access is increasingly becoming part of the engagement strategy, not simply a convenience. Reading is uncool, especially for boys Disengagement does not look the same in every classroom. Among secondary teachers, a specific cultural pattern emerges. Forty per cent of all teachers say reading is seen as uncool by their students, rising to 51% among those teaching Years 7 to 10. For boys in particular, the combination of social stigma and competing entertainment makes voluntary reading feel like swimming against the current. It does not have to stay that way. At Emmanuel College, a boys’ school in Victoria, head of libraries Sarah Derrig has seen the impact of Renaissance’s Accelerated Reader program first-hand. Teachers and parents could suddenly see, in trackable terms, how students were progressing. Progress became something concrete, something you could point to, celebrate and build a conversation around, rather than a vague sense that was hard to substantiate. Derrig states: “The boys that had never read a full book before – by the end of the year, some of them had read five or six. That data didn’t just tell us where they were. It gave us something to celebrate, and something to build on.” Following introduction of the program, the school in Term 1 2026 recorded a 97% Accelerated Reader quiz pass rate – the highest in its history. Some 78% of students are now scoring above the 85% average on quizzes, up from 57% the previous year. Words read have increased on-year by a factor of 10.

McGrath sees the Emmanuel College story as a proof point with national implications. “For boys specifically, we want to shift the cultural narrative permanently,” she says. Low reading engagement among boys is not inevitable. When students can see progress, find books that match their interests and experience reading success early, participation changes.” The school’s experience captures something essential about why the approach works. Accumulating words read toward a specific target gave boys a goal, a scoreboard and a community. Reading became something they chose to do. That combination of competition, visibility and recognition is a design choice.

“Teachers don’t need more dashboards. They need systems that reduce interpretation time and make next steps obvious”

Kate McGrath, Renaissance

From data to action The survey also exposes a paradox that will feel familiar to any teacher who has sat in front of a dashboard without the time to interpret it. While 82% of teachers agree they have access to sufficient data to make informed decisions about individual student learning needs, 31% still say tracking and reporting progress is difficult, and 58% find it hard to know in real time which students are understanding a lesson and which are not. “Teachers don’t need more dashboards,” says McGrath. “They need systems that reduce interpretation time and make next steps obvious.” Renaissance’s Complete Literacy Solution is built around that idea. Star Reading provides a diagnostic baseline, identifying each student’s reading level and growth trajectory. Accelerated Reader uses that data to recommend books matched to a student’s level and interests, then builds comprehension accountability through quizzes. Together, the platforms help schools move from isolated assessment points toward a more continuous understanding of student reading growth and engagement. The survey reinforces why the book-matching dimension matters so much to engagement. A full 93% of teachers agree that students are more motivated to read when books are matched to their reading level and interests. That is close to universal professional consensus that the right book, for the right reader, at the right time, changes behaviour. Star Reading helps teachers identify how far students are reading below year level, where specific gaps exist and whether growth is tracking as expected over time. Accelerated Reader then provides ongoing insight into comprehension and engagement between assessments, helping teachers identify when intervention may be needed earlier.

A profession ready to act What makes the YouGov survey findings useful rather than simply dispiriting is the appetite they reveal alongside the problems they document. This is not a profession that has given up. McGrath explains: “93% of teachers believe technology, used well, helps increase student participation. 82% say they feel equipped to encourage a daily reading habit. The survey suggests teachers are looking for practical ways to act on these challenges, not simply document them. It needs tools, visibility and a system-level commitment to reading that treats it as a whole-school priority, not just an English department concern.” The survey captures specific, actionable gaps. Some 81% of teachers say they would teach more interactively if they had easier tools to support classroom engagement. Some 68% say they would use reading more if they had better tools to track progress. The numbers reveal precise descriptions of what is missing in reading programs. “We want every Australian student to be seen as a reader, and to see themselves that way,” says McGrath. Getting there, the data suggests, will mean schools stop treating reading as invisible outside the classroom and start giving teachers, students and families a shared, real-time picture of progress. The technology to do that exists. The teacher willingness is already there. What is needed now is the decision to bring them together. If that happens, the balance can start to shift. Screens will not disappear. But with the right spark and the right visibility, a book can move back from obligation to invitation. The cold engine can catch, the wheels can start to turn on their own and for more Australian students, reading momentum can accelerate.

Published 15 Jun 2026

Why do teachers think students are failing to read?

Source: YouGov survey of 508 Australian teachers, April 2026

Lack of enjoyment or motivation (63%)

Screens, social media and games are biggest contributors to disengagement from reading (73%)

Screen time and devices are main barrier to regular reading at home (77%)

Key barrier teachers see to improving reading outcomes

Source: YouGov survey of 508 Australian teachers, April 2026

Difficulty monitoring home reading is a significant barrier (83%)