Going Schoolwide with Reading Engagement
Two years ago we sent our 4th and 5th grade teachers to CESA 5 to hear Donalyn Miller speak. Familiar with both of her excellent books, one of the hallmarks of her work is allowing the students to guide their own reading lives. This happens when the teacher provides opportunities for structured choice and exposure to quality, high interest literature in school.
One of the ideas gained from Donalyn that has entered our school is the reading graffiti board. A teacher created one in her classroom. The kids took off and took it over. They added quotes from their current books they were reading independently. The students also pulled memorable lines from the read alouds the teacher started facilitating on a regular basis.
Students proved themselves to be very adept at selecting quotes from the texts they were reading. That is why we tried it out on a schoolwide bulletin board. It is one way we are modeling literacy engagement, our building's goal. Specifically, we are attempting to increase questioning and student discussion in order to realize increased engagement, in both our students and teachers.
Using the companion book to Wonder by R.J. Palacio, 365 Days of Wonder provides one quote a day, as curated by Mr. Brown, a teacher from the story. He refers to these quotes as "precepts". We call them "Word We Live By" in our school. Many of the quotes come from well-know figures of past and present. Others are from fictional students in his class.
I would select one quote and read it over the announcements. Then I used a metallic marker to write on the board. The board is located next to where students line up for lunch.
As we have filled up the board, there have been signs that others want to participate in this activity. For example, one of our reading interventionists shared an anthology of quotes "collected" by Pete the Cat. See image. Whenever possible, I've included an illustration. Students and staff have shared that they like hearing me on the P.A. system daily.
Good Intentions
As our quotes filled up our board from left to right, I noticed that the marker was wearing out. The silver just wasn't as bright. In normal teacher mode, I would have gone out and purchased a new marker. But recognizing that reading and writing are participatory activities, I decided to retire my marker.
My hope was that a student or teacher would "carry the torch" and start offering thoughtful quotes of their own. I even offered a rubric for what I believe makes for a quote worth sharing.
No such luck! I guess this is a good lesson in teaching: No matter how much we model, we have to include the learners in our demonstrations at some point. This concept comes back to the gradual release of responsibility, reframed as the Optimal Learning Model by Regie Routman.
Scaling Down, Not Up
With that, I have "inducted" a few 5th grade students to find important phrases within authentic literature. I was previously meeting with a small group to discuss questionable behaviors in our school and how to solve them together. Ever the teacher, I had donned my instructor's hat and requested that they journal about how school and life in general was going for them. Lots of giggles and little depth in their responses told me that this wasn't working for anyone.
How many times does it take for someone to understand that when we tell learners to learn, it is often met with indifference and resistance? For me, I'm still counting. I've put the notebooks away for now. In it's place was a preview stack of high interest fiction for a different composition of two interested 5th graders to choose from and read together. We came to consensus on The City of Ember by Jeanne DuPrau (Yearling, 2004). I think I had them at "underground city" during my brief book talk.
It was their suggestion to bring in a third student for our Monday book club during our lunch. We agreed that a more visual example of The City of Ember might help with comprehension when reading the book later. I found the graphic novel adaptation of DuPrau's book in our school library and on iBooks. The three students could pick which text format in which they wanted to read the graphic novel in the classroom.
The next week, all three students came ready to discuss The City of Ember. I let them do most of the talking and asked a lot of questions, some of which I didn't know the answer. These inquiries were mostly about their opinions about the text, and how the graphic novel might be different than the original we would be reading next. Our conversation lasted five minutes about the book before it evolved to their plans for the week outside of school.
First Signs
At our most recent meeting, one of the students commented, "Time goes by so fast during our book club at lunch." Promising. Around this same time, a 2nd grader brought a new metallic marker from home and gave it to me as a holiday gift. She had noticed the dried out one taped to the reading graffiti board while waiting in the lunch line.
I know what to do with the new marker: When ready, hand it over to the students.