BOOK AND READING PROMOTION
This is the place to post ideas about promoting books and reading to students and teachers.
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Musical Book Browse
Grades: K-4
I got the idea for this activity from the book 30 Biography Book Reports by Deborah Rovin-Murphy (ISBN-13 978-0439215701, ISBN-10 0439215706) and adapted it to fit my situation. I first used it when our library received a grant for new books and I wanted a fun way to introduce and promote the books to students. The basic idea is that chairs are lined up around a table "musical chairs" style, but there are always enough chairs for everyone and no one ever gets "out." Since I have large rectangular tables in my library. I pushed two together and lined up the chairs around the table facing out. On the table, I put two books behind each chair. (You could also line up the chairs without tables and put the books on or under the chairs.) I began by booktalking a few of the new books. Then I played music and had the students walk slowly around the chairs. When the music stopped, I told the students to sit in the chair nearest to them, pick up the books behind that chair, and silently browse through the books. After giving them some time to browse, I asked them to close their books, neatly stack them on the table behind their chair, and stand. Then I began the music again. At the end of class, I gave students about 5 minutes to look at any book they wanted. This was a highly successful and fun way to introduce students to new books.
submitted by: Amy Brownlee, K-12 LMS
brownleea@usd376.com
Sterling USD #376
School-Wide Reading Challenge
Grades: K-6
Our reading challenge focused on biographies, but you could do it with any genre or even have a general reading challenge. To promote our new biography books (in addition to our current collection of biographies), the library issued a challenge: Could the students of Sterling Grade School read 500 biographies in 3 weeks? We called the program “Cozy up with a good biography,” and the prize for reaching the goal was an all-school pajama day (great prize because it’s fun and free!). Older classes buddied with younger classes to read the biographies (Kindy and 4th, 1st and 6th, 2nd and 5th, 3rd with college reading buddies). We kept a thermometer in the library to track students' progress. We asked teachers to tally the number of biographies read in their classroom and email the numbers to me each Friday. The student response was amazing! Our kids doubled the goal, reading 1,003 biographies in just three weeks! Wow!
Our 6th grade teachers had a great, simple idea to track the biographies read by their students. They cut out a big stack of stars from different colored construction paper using the school's die cut machine. Then every time the 6th graders read a biography, they got a star, wrote the name of the person the book was about, and stuck the star to their locker. It was a fun, easy way to keep track of the biographies read, and it was very impressive looking down the hallway!
submitted by: Amy Brownlee, K-12 LMS
brownleea@usd376.com
Sterling USD #376
School-Wide Themes
For the past few years, our school has used school-wide themes that incorporate library skills, p.e., art, music, character education, and our week-long Read Across America celebration. Our themes included Lewis and Clark, the Mississippi River, and the Hero’s Trail (biographies and local heroes). You can find details at my teacher website: http://www.usd376.com/hs/staff/brownleea/resources/themes.htm
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