Having Good Books On Your Shelves is Not Enough
It's only a start.
While it is SO important to do your research and order the latest award-winning novels for the classroom, that is only the first step in cultivating readers and fostering lifelong learners.
In many classrooms, and in my own my first two years of teaching, my books sat mostly lifeless on my shelves. Students knew they had to read two a month and would snag one with the most colorful cover every two weeks. They read, sort of, but this system didn’t inspire passion around reading. There was no engagement or excitement around the power of story when books simply sat on shelves, idly perused by apathetic adolescents.
A teacher’s role in the classroom is making stories come to LIFE for students-- and we have a lot of competition! When cellphones and Fortnite lurk around every corner and under every desktop, we MUST put in the effort to make stories exciting. I believe, based on my experiences, that there are three main factors that encourage engagement around reading.
Our library must be appealing. While it may not need all the colors or all the bins, it should be clean, neat, and organized. I love using little book stands to highlight new titles each week or season.
We need to book talk novels. They act as a movie trailer for our favorite titles. Let your enthusiasm, and the incredible story itself, do the work of hooking kids. Book talks are the #1 way I foster excitement around reading, and they often end in book wars. I mean, is there anything better than five students fighting over who gets to read a title first?!
There need to be routines in our classroom that force us to be involved in our students’ reading lives. And yes, I used the word force because I know how easy it is to allow the less pressing assignments and classroom goals go by the wayside in lieu of the next assessment or standardized test prep. An independent reading routine in your classroom will help you stay informed about your students’ reading, and it will help to hold students accountable for maintaining a reading habit. I use page goals (not reading logs or notebooks). My page goal system takes about 10 minutes per week to maintain, and students love it! It’s easy because it holds them accountable, keeps me informed, and allows kids to JUST. READ. No recording quotes, getting parent signatures, or journaling about conflict every night.
The book recommendation one pagers and students page goal tracking sheets in the next pictures are the fundamental tools I use to make an independent reading program work in my classroom. And to be honest, it does more than work. It changes my kids. It transforms them into readers who email me over the summer and come back to my room the next year for recommendations.
I love and live by these resources in my classroom because I am in the business of creating lifelong readers.
Grab the resources I use here!
StudentPageGoalTrackerCover
MiddleSchoolFavorites_OnePagersCover
ReadWithoutWalls_OnePagersCover
Happy Reading!
♥ RileyReadsYA