If a student regularly completes their work early...

Reading fiction has all sorts of advantages

1. It is an incentive to the student. Not only will they be gainfully occupied while the teacher gives time attention to the struggling students, if the student in question actually enjoys reading then they will be less resentful of having to attend the class.

1. reading improves vocabulary and introduces concepts outside normal daily life.

1. Reading fiction may trigger an interest they may pursue at a later date. e.g. I read my Mother's Issac Bashiev Singer and Chaim Potok books while bored on holiday when 10I was a precocious brat. While there was much there I didn't understand, it triggered an interest in religions and cultures that ultimately determined what I studied for my first degree.

If I was a teacher, I would let the pupil read a book of his own choice. I would only check if it's appropriate.

Becuase we are talking about secondary aged children here who have not yet had the breadth of curriculum to determin whether they will be the next Einstein or Wittgenstein.

Why force Einstein to read Goethe when he's torn between whether to sort out Brownian motion or the photoelectric effect etc first?

Reading unrelated fiction sounds a bit crap tbh. Why can't they read a book on the subject?

Sugartongue - no point making you repeat endless equations, but surely giving you harder equations would have been beneficial.

It was what happened to me - the only way to stop me distracting the rest of the class by chatting to them was to let me read a book. And it was a massive benefit to me - all that extra reading of decent literature instead of someone making me do some more sums...

Let's see, what would I do if the pupil has finished the extension work too?

Force them to temper their progress to your standards?
Make them do it again? And again. And again.
Ignore them as long as they sit quietly staring at their completed work?
Tell them to go somewhere else more suitable? Oops but we tell everyone we're the best school on the planet...
Ignore my own insecurities and let them explore at their own pace something loosely academic?

Some kids spend a dozen years waiting out school, and if they're allowed to follow their interests, even if it's fiction, maybe that will keep their natural curiosity alive and humour intact. I struggle with fully understanding parents saying their child is bored. Boredom is not a behaviour related to learning. The best thing a child like that can learn is to be confident about searching out what they want to learn. Have some mercy. Let the chap read the book.

Agree with titchy that some material is less good though.

It can be if they're reading something relevant to the subject that will stretch them. Reading Hello magazine probably wouldn't be regarded as good!

If a few students are completing their work early though the teacher should have some actual extension work available as well as wider reading.