Wednesday, August 5, 2009

Success

I am excited by the success we are having with the children choosing their own books to read. I have had 2 parents comment about how their children are reading, reading and reading (boys!!!) and discussing the progress of their story. They have chosen lengthier books and we decided it would be easier to write a 1-2 sentence summary after each chapter. They race to tell me each day what has happened in the story. They are eager to read each others book next. I am seeing a growing love of books - what more can I ask for, a teacher's dream.

Monday, August 3, 2009

Children's Choice

Today the children decided whether they were ready to go it alone and choose their own book. 4 chose to and 4 decided they wanted to work with the new book I had. I have given them the choice of exploring new roles or if they wish to, keep working with the package of 4 roles we have been using. Interesting for me, when we have discussion groups and interviews with the group I had split them into 4 and 4 (profilic discussers and quieter contributors). This is how they have split today. Not sure what it means, but I guess confidence levels come into play with going it alone. It feels like we are moving to a new dimension now. Probably closer to the truer form of Literature Circles as Harvey Daniels sees it. 

Life will be interesting in our blog/discussions as the children will not have read the same books. The children commented today that they would have to do great summaries so the others would know what their story was about. They also commented that they would probably have more questions to ask each other as they would have to explain more things to each other. Again - the authentic audience and knowing others are interested in what you are writing has come into play and given meaning to the tasks. Quite an exciting direction for us.

Neat to have the children working out with me how me would put their choice of books on our wiki. We think we've got a workable plan - we'll have to see.