Page 44 - JOURNAL OF LIBRARY SCIENCE IN CHINA 2018 Vol. 42

XIA Lixin, LI Chenglong & SUN Jingqiong / An exploratory study on the construction of standards 043
and assessment of national reading based on multi-dimensional integration

and publication distribution of various types of reading materials based on citizens’ needs. It is the
beginning of the reading resources flow chain. The assessment on reading resources production
is mainly intended to regulate and guide various types of reading materials, including 1) to
ensure that all the reading materials comply with laws, regulations, and specifications of relevant
information and documentation standards, thus to meet the basic reading needs of all citizens; and
2) to direct publishers and related agencies to create reading materials that meet the needs of target
groups and be of high quality, thus to improve the quality of national reading.
For the former, the laws, regulations, and specifications in China and overseas are well
developed that are not in the scope of this study, while the standards on the high quality reading
materials is fairly few. The International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions
released No. 120 professional reports entitled Guidelines for Easy-to-read Materials(IFLA,
2015b), which describes the nature of and the need for easy-to-read publications, identifies the
main target groups, and offers suggestions to publishers and other agencies pertaining to language,
content, design, and levels of difficulty to make a text easy-to-read. However, the guidelines need
to be further specialized, not just providing guidance in theory.
Though there are not many ways to directly guide publishers and related agencies to create
better quality and more targeted reading materials, the standards below can be for reference.
(1) The grade reading guides for children and adolescents
The international well-known grade reading guides include Guided Reading Level(“Reading
A-Z”, 2015),the Lexile Framework for Reading (“Lexile”, 2015), Developmental Reading
Assessment(2015),Common Sense Media(2015), etc. And in China, the Southern Grade Reading
Centers issued the Selection Criteria of Grade Reading Content for Children and Adolescents in
China and the Evaluation Criteria of Grade Reading Level for Children and Adolescents in China.
While the guides were designed to recommend or provide reading materials for children and
adolescents at different ages based on their intellectual and mental development, the content can
guide publishers and related agencies to publish targeted reading materials for them as well.
(2) The evaluation criteria for book awards
Book award is for selecting high quality books from huge number of books that are of worth in
literature and art. The criteria can also be seen as a way to guide publishers and related agencies
to create good materials. For instance, the evaluation criteria for Kate Greenaway Medal include
artistic style, format, synergy of illustration and text, and visual experience (CILIP Carnegie and
Kate Greenaway Awards Team, 2015), while Randolph Caldecott Medal considers more about
illustrations, which covers artistic technique, pictorial interpretation of and appropriateness of
style to the story, theme, or concept, and delineation of plot, theme, characters, setting, mood or
information through the pictures (Association for Library Service to Children, 2008).They both
provide references for children publishers.
(3) The compiling rules for recommended bibliography
Recommended bibliography is compiled for particular purposes and readers, and recommends