Reading Matters Winter 2019

Discussing Books Across Grade Levels: Refining the Art of Virtual Book Clubs

By Audrey Jennings, Powdersville Elementary and Amy Fortner, McCants Middle School

The Problem In the public school setting, students do not always feel comfortable or supported in talking about the books they read (Young, 2014). Students seem to almost have an automatic instinct when it comes to answering a teacher’s questions about a text. It is like second nature to them. However, students are not as easily able to talk to each other and hold a meaningful conversation about a book when asked to do so. When students reach the 3rd and 4th grade levels the focus on comprehension becomes greater. We propose that Virtual Book Clubs are a creative way to get students excited about reading and talking about books, thus enhancing their comprehension skills at a crucial time in their reading development. The Context and Participants Two teachers from different grade levels and different schools set out to address the challenges observed when students are asked to discuss a text in depth with other students. The teachers hypothesized that creating book club groups that included students from another grade and school would raise the level of interest and effort in the book discussion as students would be presented with an audience that extended beyond the school. Using the Fountas & Pinnell leveling system, students were matched across grade levels to guide text selection for book club groups. Students were first assessed in each teacher’s classroom at the beginning of the project. A design-based research approach was taken to refining the process of conducting these inter-school and inter-grade book clubs. Design-based research (DBR; Reinking and Bradley, 2008) allow for promising interventions, such as virtual book For this particular project, the third graders selected from Powdersville Elementary were amongst the highest achieving students within that classroom. The four students chosen, two female and two male, were reading on a level Q with the Fountas and Pinnell system at the beginning of the project. Three of these students were identified as gifted and talented. The fourth student had the potential to be in gifted and talented but had not placed into that program at the beginning of this project. The fourth grade students fromMerrywood Elementary were considered average but had the potential to be considered high average. The four students selected, two female and two male, were also identified at the beginning of the project as reading on level Q of the Fountas and Pinnell system. One goal the teachers set for this group was to support them in attaining a high average level. clubs, to be refined through an iterative and systematic process of implementing, evaluating, and modulating.

Our selection of high achieving students was based on our observation that strong readers of often neglected in the guided reading classroom. Because they are identified as being high readers they are expected to work more independently so that the classroom teacher can focus on the lower readers. Those higher achieving students are often bored with the day to day expectations for them for the nearly hour-long guided reading time each day. The highest group of readers in a guided reading classroom are typically only met with once a week for instruction as compared to the other groups of readers in the classroom who may see the teacher anywhere from three to five days a week for instruction. These higher readers truly crave more learning than just what is provided once a week. The problem was to figure out how to address their needs as high achieving learners but not neglect those lower readers who needed direct teacher attention and instruction daily. Our plan to develop and refine Virtual Book Clubs across settings seemed to be more of a win-win when involving the high achieving students. Implementing the Book Clubs At the onset of this project it was quickly realized that students at this age level did not even know truly what a book club is by definition. Students did not realize that book clubs, people meeting together to talk about a similar book, was something that people actually do in everyday life. The teachers couldn’t assume that students were prepared to just jump in and have a book club amongst themselves. Students had to first be shown what a book club is actually like in real life. The teachers modeled for the students what a book club truly looks like. Before allowing students to communicate across schools with each other about a text, each teacher held book clubs within their own classrooms first before introducing the students to each other across schools. Students needed some guidance and direction to get started. Students were assigned roles such as vocabulary enricher, literary luminary, discussion director, and checker/grader for each in classroom book club session. Students rotated roles for each session in order to provide fairness and accountability. Once students learned how a book club worked, students were ready to communicate across schools about a similar text with a Virtual Book Club. Cycle 1: The LemonadeWar To get students engaged and excited about communicating as a book club member across technology with students at another school, the app SeeSaw was used as a means to introduce students to each other. Students were able to post a picture and a few

Reading Matters Teaching Matters

Reading Matters | Volume 19 Winter 2019 | scira.org | 41

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