I
won’t be able to share any current experiences with using technology to foster
a culture of reading within a classroom, but I will share ideas that I plan on
implementing with the use of technology, and without, when I become a TL. In my research, I found several interesting
articles that outline some current practices of promoting reading cultures in China
that can easily be incorporated in any library or classroom.
I
believe modeling is essential in anyone learning pretty much anything, so when
students are silently reading, I will too, or if they are doing independent
work at their desks or in groups. My
daughter is always asking what I’m reading when we read together, and if she’s
allowed to read it, or how old she has to be before she can read it, but the
most important thing is that she is interested because she sees that I am. Something that the librarian in my middle
school did, that I would put into practice, was start a book club that met once
a week at lunch hour to discuss the book of the month, and when each book was
finished, we would put up a rating on our book club poster board.
As
I am not overly familiar with ICT, I asked a couple of teacher friends if there
were any favorite tools that they used to encourage reading in their students,
the most popular one was any one of the storybooks online, such as: Starfall, Just
Books Read Aloud, Mightybook, or, the most popular choice, Tumble Books. When I did some research on the Internet, I
did find some other sites that I have heard of, and used, such as
ReadWriteThink and PBS Kids, which both have games and activities that help
develop phonics, grammar, spelling, comprehension, and sentence structure. By providing students with a variety of tools
that assist them in strengthening their reading skills, they will be more
confident, and willing, to read for pleasure. Another way that I believe fosters a culture of reading, is having Author Visits to the school, but if physically having the author come to your school is not in the budget, a cheap alternative is to google what Skype Author Visits are planned, and you can Skype with an author via a large projection screen (or laptop, depending on audience size).
I found seven separate PDF files that make one
paper that was put out by the Education Bureau of the Government of the Hong
Kong Special Administrative Region, outlining the library programs at six of
their schools, with each school focusing on the development of a reading
culture within their school, and outside, at the homes of their students. I apologize that I couldn’t find one PDF that
covered the whole paper, but each school implements different programs (or
schemes) and its worth the trouble to read each section (which are no more than
nine pages each, two for the introduction).
I will give the title of the school, point form list of their schemes
for developing a culture of reading in their schools, and a link to the PDF.
Introduction
Canossa
Primary School
-
Reading
Star Scheme
-
Class
Reading Stars
-
Parents
as Reading Companion Scheme
-
Senior
Peer Reading Companion Scheme
Lam Tin Methodist
Primary School
-
Parent-and-Child
Reading Scheme
-
Big
Brother & Big Sister Scheme
-
Reading
Aunts
-
The
ISLM Bookmark Project (***an international program that could be brought into
your own library!)
-
Production
of Braille Books to Enhance Harmony
-
Teacher
Reading Award Scheme
-
Promoting
Parent Education to Strengthen the Partnership Between Parents and the School
Download Lam TIn PDF here
King’s College Old
Boy’s Association Primary School No. 2
-
It’s
Fun Reading Together
-
Drama
on Shared Reading
-
Reading
Bean
-
Mathematics
Quest
-
Story
Creation Competition
-
Parent-and-Child
Reading Scheme
-
Story
Brothers & Sisters
-
Big
Brother, Big Sister Reading Scheme
Download King's College PDF here
Concordia Lutheran
School-North Point
-
Morning
Reading Scheme
-
“Reading
for All” Reading Programme
-
Top
10 Patrons/Top 10 Books
-
Books
Recommendation & Sharing
-
Students’
Participation in External Competitions & Activities
Download Concordia PDF here
Lok Sin Tong Yu Kan
Hing Secondary School
-
The
Reading Team: Agency for Communication Between the Librarian & Teachers
-
Morning
Reading Programme
-
Reading
Variety Show
-
Chinese
Language Panel
-
English
Language Panel
-
The
Mathematics Panel
-
Cross-Curriculum
Collaboration
Download Lok Sin PDF here
Tuen Mun Catholic
Secondary School
-
Book
exhibitions
-
Reading
Activity with Taiwan Students-Online Reading Platform
-
Early
Morning Reading Scheme
-
TMCSS
Reading Club
-
Chinese
Extensive Reading Scheme
Download Tuen Mun PDF here
I’m
finishing off with the addition of a paper written by Nancy K. Schroeder in
partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Degree of Master of Education
from the University of Alberta, April 6 2009.
Titled, Developing a Culture of
Reading in Middle School: What Teacher-Librarians Can Do, and at 47 pages
it is an amazing paper that addresses many issues that TL’s face when trying to
promote a culture of reading, and it is definately worth setting aside some to
read it.
Some really great ideas here that I hope you'll get to try soon! Your examples, discussions with colleagues, and linked up PDF files (good job!) are good idea prompts and strong suggestions for increasing buzz about reading. Thanks for working through some of your tech challenges and getting this going!
ReplyDeleteThanks for the idea of Skype author visits, with Quebecois(e) authors it can be expensive having them travel to BC but a Skype visit would be a great alternative. At one step down I like to use author you-tube videos I choose things like interviews or book promos. The one I just did for the grade 4's is Dave Pilkey's make a flip book. Titled: Ook and Glok flip-o-rama, students need a pencil, and about 1/2 sheet of paper or less) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z89IqxaSvwo . Students can follow along and do this in my 1/2 hour library block. I just stop it when they need to catch up on the drawing.
ReplyDeleteConnecting with authors is a great idea. In one of my courses last semester I bookmarked these two links: http://cwill.bc.ca/search/custom and http://www.katemessner.com/authors-who-skype-with-classes-book-clubs-for-free/ (but I can't get this link to load anymore so not sure if you will have more luck). Another author that has great Youtube videos is Oliver Jeffers.
ReplyDeleteYou have provided lots of great ideas for fostering a reading culture. I particularly like the idea of Story Brothers and Sisters found in the King's College document. For our French Immersion school, having older students tell stories to primary students is a great way for them to practice their French skills as well as develop a sense of leadership.
ReplyDeleteMy Biggest advocacy plan for fostering a reading culture is to have as much parent involvement as possible. You mentioned that modelling is essential and I completely agree. Not only as parents but as teachers too. A lot of the schools I TTOC at have designated reading breaks (20 minutes) but often the teachers use it for marking or prepping for the next class etc. At the high school level the students notice these things and then they start doing their homework or off task behaviour because if the teacher isn't reading why should they? In my elementary experience we use to buddy read with older students and our hallways would be lined with partner reading all through out the school for 20 minutes a day. I don't see that as often anymore. A lot of schools do small group activities with levelled readers.
ReplyDeleteSkyping with a children's author would be my cup of tea :) I am going to search online for authors who do this sort of thing with schools :)