When I work with elementary teachers, one of the biggest challenges they face is the wide range of reading skills in their classrooms. A first-grade class may have students who are struggling to decode while other students are reading at a third-grade level. This presents significant challenges as teachers attempt to support students below grade-level while challenging those readers who are above grade level.
Most of the teachers I coach at the elementary level are using the Station Rotation Model during their English language block. Students rotate through a series of online and offline stations designed to develop their reading skills. In an effort to challenge students who are above reading level, I worked with a first-grade teacher, Jessica Perry, to design a book club for advanced readers using Google Slides and FlipGrid.
To create the book club project, we created two Google Slide decks. One slide deck titled “Book Club Directions” had the day by day instructions for their work. This allowed students to self-pace through the various activities.
bit.ly/DirectionsElemBookClub
The second slide deck titled “Book Club Template for Students” had space for students to record their responses to various prompts about their reading. We assigned that deck to the students via Google Classroom, which made a copy of the book club template for each student participating in the book club.
bit.ly/ElemBookClubTemplate
Students were so excited to participate in the book club! It became an incentive for those students working on Lexia, an online adaptive reading program, to make significant progress so they could spend part of their ELA block reading a book of their choice and completing the book club activities. I hope other elementary teachers can take this idea and run with it!
19 Responses
Hi The bit.ly link to the elembookclubtemplate is not working. Could you repost? Thanks!
They are both working for me, Lisa. The URL is case sensitive. Can you try it again capitalizing the letters that need to be capitalized?
Catlin
I know you posted this last year but the links have been deleted. Would it be possible to get both slide decks?
Hi Suzy,
I’ve updated the direction slide deck. Here is the new link –> http://bit.ly/DirectionsElemBookClub
The link to the slide deck template for students should still work.
Catlin
Great idea! Can you share the two slide decks?
I have 5th graders just at level now at the beginning of the school year and some at 3rd grade level, this will help a lot.
[…] Elementary Book Club for Advanced Readers | […]
The second link to the book club template isn’t working.
Hi Brittany,
It’s working for me, but here is the direct link –> https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1K7u3IuBChsnXWnQZSXVvKcB1lEEIt1ue3pI_BvcABpI/edit
Catlin
the link to record a video on the directions deck doesn’t seem to work! Can you help with that?
Hi Melissa,
I’ve removed all of the links to the videos where kids posted recordings. You can add your own if you set up a FlipGrid topic.
Catlin
Thank you so much this is a great activity to use with my independent readers.
Hi Caitlin!
Thanks so much for this resource. My 4th graders are going to love it!
Question: Are the book club directions just on You Tube or is their also a Google slides one too?
Oops..used the wrong their…should be there. 🙂
Hi Kim,
The link to the directions slide deck are here –> http://bit.ly/DirectionsElemBookClub
Catlin
I am getting the message that the directions slide deck has been deleted. Is it no longer available?
Hi Alice,
Try this link –> http://bit.ly/DirectionsElemBookClub
Let me know if that works for you.
Catlin
This looks awesome! I am looking forward to trying it out with my students! I am wondering about the following: How do you assess students based on this task? Do you assess the overall task and/or each day? Do you use a rubric highlighting the reading skills you have addressed in the daily tasks? Thanks!
Hi Carly,
I would NOT suggest teachers try to assign points or grades each day. Instead, I encourage teachers to select 2-3 skills that students will need to demonstrate in this playlist and assess those at the end.
Catlin