Understanding why reading is important for students goes far beyond grades. It directly shapes how the brain develops focus, memory, and the executive function skills students need for life. And yet, for millions of students, reading remains one of the most significant and least-addressed academic challenges they face.
I began my English teaching career in 2018. I taught all levels of 9th and 12th grade, from remedial to advanced. Even then, I was concerned with what seemed to be a large gap in the ability to read at grade level across all of my classes.
The literacy crisis is getting more attention every day. However, it is due to an issue that has existed for generations. At one point, it was not considered a crisis at all. Historically, only certain races and classes of people — often white, wealthy men — could learn to read, even as recently as the 1960s.
When all races and classes were finally given access to literacy education, experts fought to expand it for everyone. Think of the push for diverse educational shows like Sesame Street, Between the Lions, and Reading Rainbow.
The Reading Wars of the 1980s and 1990s debated how to teach literacy, since adult literacy gaps were appearing in concerning numbers. This continued into the 2000s and 2010s when traditional phonics instruction was replaced with whole language instruction. In the 2020s, many curricula have returned to phonics-based instruction in an effort to bridge the widening gap.
Today, the literacy crisis still disproportionately impacts students of color and students with disabilities, especially those with ADHD and learning disabilities. It is more important than ever to push for effective reading intervention — especially since the benefits of reading for students outweigh the nonexistent downsides.
Why Is Reading Important? The Importance of Reading for Brain Development
Why is reading important? The short answer is that it is one of the most powerful tools available for developing a healthy, capable brain. The ability to read a book is the difference between achieving career and financial milestones, maintaining brain health, and even living longer. The importance of reading for students cannot be overstated.
But for children with executive function challenges, reading can feel like a struggle. While deficits in executive functioning can make it harder to read, it does not mean it is impossible. With time and the right strategies, reading can actually become a powerful bridge to building better executive function skills.
Why Is Reading Important? What the Research Says
The American Academy of Neurology found that reading for 30 minutes a day increases cognitive function and can slow cognitive decline. Beyond keeping the brain active, reading can also expand your lifespan. A study published in Social Science and Medicine suggests a 20% reduction in mortality risk for those who read books regularly.
Reading also builds understanding of world events and empathy for others. Did you prefer when history class was a dry summary of events? Or did you prefer hearing and reading stories from a person’s perspective as it happened? That difference is the importance of reading in action — it transforms information into lived understanding.
Why Is Reading an Important Skill for Students to Develop Early?
Why is reading an important skill specifically for students? Because reading is not just one skill — it is a gateway to every other academic skill a student will need throughout their education and career.
Like exercising your body, exercising your brain is an essential part of a well-rounded routine. Avid readers experience heightened empathy and understanding of perspectives outside of their own. Age-related cognitive issues, like memory loss, can be slowed significantly. The earlier a student develops strong reading habits, the greater the compounding benefit over time.
Think of getting better at reading as training for a marathon. Simply running without a goal or proper warm-ups will not get you the best outcome. In fact, training incorrectly leads to injury or discouragement. For kids, it is the same way. Forced reading or approaching a child with executive function challenges with the order to just read it will often backfire.
But when given the right strategies and a degree of choice in reading topics, students show remarkable improvement. According to the Learning Disabilities Association of America, a child’s ability to read and sustain attention is directly linked to executive function. Working memory, focus, and the ability to prioritize tasks are all required for reading — which means developing reading skills simultaneously develops executive function.
What Four Parts of the Brain Does Reading Activate?
Reading engages four different parts of the brain at once:
- The visual cortex helps the eyes track letters and words
- The phonological cortex helps match sounds to letters
- The semantic cortex stores the meaning of words
- The syntactic cortex helps the brain understand sentence structure
For children with learning disabilities or executive functioning challenges, the left hemisphere of the brain is often underactive while the rest of the brain tries to compensate. This is why ADHD reading specifically requires particular strategies to ensure the best outcomes.
How Reading Builds Executive Function in Students
Reading is one of the most powerful strategies available for building foundational executive function skills. Specifically, reading utilizes working memory, self-monitoring, task initiation, and cognitive flexibility — all at the same time.
It all starts before even opening a book. Choosing to begin the task takes energy and effort. Then the actual reading begins. Comprehension of what is being read requires significant brainpower to maintain. Finally, remembering what was read and summarizing it involves multiple executive function skills working simultaneously.
It is important to meet a student where they are in their journey. A child who struggles with reading will not gain much from being forced into advanced texts. As often as possible, allow students to choose what they read — from chapter books to online articles about things they are interested in. Buy-in during the early days of reading intervention builds the confidence needed to tackle harder material later.
Tools like Uluru can help students track their progress and chunk large reading passages into something approachable — turning a mammoth-sized text into a series of manageable steps. Adjusting reading level on texts can also meet student needs while still delivering valuable information and meaningful practice.
Reading Comprehension and ADHD: What Parents Need to Know
ADHD and reading are often seen as opposites. However, that framing is both inaccurate and unhelpful. Reading comprehension and ADHD have a complex relationship that every parent and educator should understand.
The late clinical psychologist Thomas E. Brown, PhD, estimated that as many as 45% of those with ADHD also have a learning disability, such as dyslexia. A lesser-known common diagnosis is Specific Reading Comprehension Deficit, or S-RCD. S-RCD presents as a student reading fluently and proficiently — but without genuine understanding of the words they are reading.
Can Students with ADHD Be Strong Readers?
Here is something that may surprise you: ADHD is not always associated with reading difficulties. In fact, some children and adults with ADHD are considered hyperlexic — exceptionally advanced in reading with an impressive vocabulary.
However, you may notice something unusual: when asked about what happened in the book or asked to recall a specific event, they may not be able to. The brain has processed the words without retaining the meaning. That is because of a key gap shared by students with both reading difficulties and hyperlexia: reading comprehension and executive function challenges often co-occur, regardless of reading fluency.
Even so, it does not mean a child is unable to enjoy reading or improve their comprehension. It means they need a different approach — one that builds the executive function skills that comprehension depends on.
Does Reading Help with ADHD? What the Research Says
Does reading help with ADHD? The answer is yes — but approach matters significantly.
Whether your child is an enthusiastic reader or a reluctant one, several strategies should be used to build the executive function skills that promote comprehension. The key is finding texts that are appropriately challenging but genuinely interesting. While students cannot always choose their reading materials, giving choice during skill-building makes it easier to focus and build confidence before moving to harder materials.
Reading Strategies That Work for ADHD Students
Graphic organizers. A graphic organizer is a visual tool for separating and mapping ideas. From tough vocabulary to key points in a book, graphic organizers are essential for retaining information. Many are available online, and teachers often have subject-specific versions they can share for home practice.
Sticky notes. A stray thought can derail the entire reading process if it has nowhere to go. Sticky notes give students a place to capture random thoughts, key quotes, or points they want to remember — without losing their place or their focus.
Annotating texts. Annotating means highlighting, underlining, and making small notes within a book or passage. It directly activates working memory, self-monitoring, task initiation, and cognitive flexibility. Before beginning, ask your child which colors they want to use for each category. Suggested categories include new vocabulary, main ideas, interesting facts, and character traits.
How Reading Improves Memory, Attention Span, and Focus
One of the most well-documented benefits of reading is its impact on memory and attention. If you have ever wondered how to improve attention span, reading is one of the most evidence-based answers available.
An American Psychological Association podcast interview with Gloria Mark, PhD, revealed that the average attention span in 2012 was 75 seconds. In recent years, it has lowered to 40 seconds. Google Trends reports that searches for how to increase attention span have increased 80% over the past five years.
Reading improves memory and attention through direct neurological mechanisms. A 2023 study in Oxford’s Cerebral Cortex indicated that reading print materials for at least 30 minutes a day helps increase gray matter volume and strengthens connections within the ventral attention network — the part of the brain responsible for sustaining focus.
In other words, reading does not just exercise the brain generally. It specifically strengthens the neural pathways most directly associated with attention, memory, and executive functioning. The more consistently a student reads, the stronger those pathways become.
Benefits of Reading for Students: A Quick Summary
Why is reading important? Here is a direct summary of the core benefits of reading for students:
- Better focus — less time on screens and more time with books means reclaiming attention span that screens gradually erode
- Improved memory — reading strengthens the neural pathways associated with working memory and information retention
- Less screen time — reducing screen time means better sleep, less anxiety, and less physical strain from device use
- A longer lifespan — several studies have shown that consistent readers live longer than non-readers
- Cognitive exercise — using the brain keeps it sharp, even as age increases cognitive demands
- Stronger executive function — reading utilizes working memory, self-monitoring, task initiation, and cognitive flexibility simultaneously. The more a student reads, the stronger their overall executive function becomes
How Uluru Supports Reading and Executive Function Skills
Your child’s reading assignments are not impossible. But to them, it may feel that way. They may stare at an assignment for an hour or feel overwhelmed at the thought of opening a book.
Uluru approaches students at their level. Rather than providing answers, Uluru guides students through the executive function skills that make tackling any assignment — including reading — feel manageable. Task initiation, goal setting, self-monitoring, progress tracking, and time awareness are all built into the app, connecting directly with your student’s learning platform.
Instead of removing the challenge, Uluru builds the skills that make the challenge feel approachable. That is the difference between a student who avoids reading and one who develops the confidence to engage with it independently.
Visit theuluru.com to learn more and start with a complimentary account.
Frequently Asked Questions About Why Reading Is Important for Students
Why is reading important for students?
Reading is important for students because it simultaneously develops multiple executive function skills — including working memory, focus, self-monitoring, and cognitive flexibility — while building vocabulary, comprehension, empathy, and academic knowledge. Strong reading skills are consistently correlated with higher academic achievement, greater career success, and better long-term brain health.
Why reading is important for students with ADHD specifically?
For students with ADHD, reading is important because it directly exercises the executive function skills that ADHD most commonly affects — attention, working memory, and self-monitoring. With the right strategies, reading becomes both a skill-building activity and a therapeutic one, helping students develop the internal resources they need for independent learning.
Why is reading fundamental to student success?
Reading is fundamental because it is the foundation every other academic subject builds on. A student who cannot read effectively cannot fully access history, science, mathematics, or any other discipline. Beyond academics, reading is fundamental to navigating adult life — from understanding contracts to following medical instructions to engaging with current events.
Why is reading an important skill to develop early?
Reading is most important to develop early because the brain is most neuroplastic — most able to form new connections — during childhood. Early reading development builds the neural pathways for attention, memory, and language that everything else in a student’s academic journey depends on. Students who develop strong reading habits early consistently outperform peers who do not, across every subject and grade level.
Why is it important to read aloud to students?
Reading aloud to students builds phonological awareness, vocabulary, listening comprehension, and a positive association with reading before students can decode text independently. For students with ADHD or executive functioning challenges, being read to also reduces the cognitive load of decoding so the brain can focus entirely on comprehension — which helps build the meaning-making skills that often lag behind fluency.
What are the benefits of reading for students?
The benefits of reading for students include improved focus and attention span, stronger working memory, reduced screen time, better sleep, greater empathy, enhanced vocabulary, stronger executive functioning skills, and even a longer lifespan. Reading is one of the few activities that exercises the brain comprehensively and consistently with no negative side effects.
How does reading improve memory in students?
Reading improves memory by activating and strengthening the neural pathways associated with working memory and information retention. A 2023 study in Oxford’s Cerebral Cortex found that reading print materials for at least 30 minutes daily increases gray matter volume and enhances connectivity within the ventral attention network — the brain region most directly associated with sustained attention and memory encoding.
Does reading help with ADHD?
Yes, reading helps with ADHD when approached with the right strategies. Reading exercises the exact executive function skills that ADHD most affects — attention, working memory, and self-monitoring. Graphic organizers, sticky notes, text annotation, and appropriate text selection all make reading more accessible and effective for students with ADHD. Consistent reading practice builds the neurological pathways that support better focus over time.
