Connecting to the World through Books
May 31st, 2010 | By Rachel Elliott | Category: Lead Story, Literacy Project
Each and every day I try to create learning experiences that allow my students to feel connected to the world that we live in. As our world seemingly shrinks because of our connectivity it sometimes feels like we are less connected to those around us more than ever. In an attempt to connect my students to the world, and to provide them with meaningful experiences, I have teamed up with Edwards Magazine book club to turn my students into book reviewers! The opportunity arose in a seemingly ordinary email from Christine Gordon Manley offering book reviews for Scholastic, a publisher that is well known for bringing literacy to children across our country.
When I posed the opportunity to my grade 7 students, they were ecstatic and quick to jump on board. As soon as I had a group of dedicated (if not totally devoted) students on board, we took a look at the catalogue and picked the books we thought would be good for our age group. The fact that the reviews were going to be published in an online magazine seemed to cause quite a buzz amongst the students—in one meeting, they spent hours pouring over the reviews already posted at Edwards Magazine (Book Club) and generating ideas for our own book review format. We agreed on a format that our reviews would take so that our reviews would be cohesive and follow a format that we all liked. The students could hardly wait for the books to arrive at the school, asking me daily if I had checked my mail in the office.
Our books arrived three days before spring break and the students didn’t wait to get home to dive in—one teacher even commented that it was hard to get the students to do anything but read their books for the first few days. As soon as spring break was over, the students were eager to start their reviews—I have never seen students so eager to write! In the first round of reviews, the students were encouraged to reflect on how the book related to them and who they would like to recommend it to and they are being encouraged to pass the books on to a friend or family member that they feel would enjoy it.
As a teacher, watching this level of enthusiasm was incredibly rewarding. Not once have I had to ask the students to complete their reading or their reviews— the intrinsic motivation of knowing that they will be published has been more than enough. It made me think about how I could use this format in the future. One of my roles at my school is teaching students that are learning English as a Second Language and I hope that I can create a similar experience for these students. I am always looking for meaningful ways to encourage new English students to read and write and I can’t think of a better way to reinforce their English skills than to have them use them in such a real life way. Just knowing that their work would be published online provides a new element to writing that is difficult to create in a traditional classroom setting.
Editor’s Note: To read the reviews written by students at Samuel W. Shaw School, Calgary, Alberta, please click the links below. Please note that reviews will be added as they are written, so check back often!
Purge by Sarah Littman
Wish by Alexandra Bullen
After All You’re Callie Boone by Winnie Mack
Cinderella Cleaners Change of a Dress by Maya Gold
Green Witch by Alice Hoffman
Stolen Child by Marsha Forchuk Skrypuch
What I Saw and How I Lied by Judy Blundell
After Ever After by Jordan Sonnenblick
Countdown by Deborah Wiles
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