With this being my first year teaching literacy, I have taken small steps in ensuring my students are engaged in their reading. I really beefed up my library this year by taking on a TON of books from a teacher who retired last year, as well as ordering some books I knew would be engaging for my students. Even with this new beefed up library, through talking with my students and helping them pick out books, I am noticing that there is more I could/need to include in my library. I have started to ask for assistance from other teachers in finding book suggestions for students and even having them bring books over for my class. This has been helpful, so far, in creating more interest for some students, since I am tailoring this work to them.
Through read alouds and some of the history lessons I have created, I have been able to introduce and excite a handful of students into new authors and topics. I am planning on starting a recommendation list in our classroom, where students can write down a book or author that they loved reading and a little blurb about the book, which will help expand the class' repertoire of books.
I am excited to read the other blog posts to learn many other ways I can engage students in reading!
Starting a classroom library is always difficult. Over the next couple of years you will probably have so many great books. I love the recommendation list idea. Keep your eyes out. You never know when or where you will find good books for free or cheap!
ReplyDeleteA recommendation list is a great idea. Kids get excited by what their peers are reading and respond. Building that culture of sharing books and likes/dislikes also shows that books speak to different people in different ways. Sometimes a simple "You might like this book" post somewhere in your class that kids can add to is inspiring. Kids post a simple title, author, and sentence or two to get others interested.
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