Book Club
As part of a book club, students learn how to think deeply about what they read and share their ideas with their friends.
As they read, students occasionally write their reflections on the Book Club Blog. Students make connections, write in the style of the author, or imagine alternate endings to the book they are reading. After completing a book, students also posted their own creative stories on the blog.
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Second graders lead an independent book club for the first time.
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After reflecting on their first book club, the group gives it another shot.
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Book Club Agenda
Reading Check
Make a Plan
- Did everyone complete the reading?
- If not, what happened? How can we support you to get the reading done? What strategies might help you finish your work in the future?
- Did everyone complete the summaries and discussion questions?
- If not, what happened? Why is it important to summarize as you read and write discussion questions?
- If the summaries or discussion questions are not high quality, how can we improve the quality? Stop and revisit skills if necessary.
- If too many people did not finish the reading, this meeting will need to be about work habits or reading strategies. Regroup and make a new plan so that next time, we can have a successful meeting.
- One student starts by reading their summary, or summarizing the section from memory.
- Other students listen and add on other important parts that were missing from that summary, working together to recall a complete summary of the section.
- Students should not just take turns reading their summaries. It’s important for students to listen to what’s already been said and decide if they have something new to add, or if they are satisfied with the summary as is.
- A student asks a discussion question that they wrote down on a sticky note or that they have thought of in the discussion.
- Everyone discusses the question.
- Invite people into the conversation who haven’t contributed yet.
- “What do you think, _____?”
- Repeat!
Make a Plan
- How much should we read next time?
- Should we write a blog post?
- How have we been doing with work completion? Are we ready to take on a bigger chunk of reading? Do we need to scale it back a little?
- Write the plan on the board. Students choose one person from each class to write it on the board in their classroom.