It has gone very well so far. Although our numbers dwindled to four steady students, it has been completely worth my time. Just knowing that a few of our students are continuing their reading throughout the summer makes my heart sing. I know that these same students would continue to read even if we didn't have the book club, but I am enjoying connecting with these students on a deeper level by connecting through books.
As part of my own personal professional development, I decided to help co-organize a professional book club using Edmodo. Another teacher from California and I tossed around some titles we thought would be worth while, and we've been discussing two of the books so far, and adding how we plan to implement some of the ideas in our own classrooms.
The two books we we've read are Readicide by Kelly Gallagher and The Book Whisperer by Donalyn Miller. I would have to say that these two extraordinary educators are more closely aligned to my own philosophy on teaching. Having been handed a curriculum and texts, I felt awkward and shameful of carrying on with the traditional form of teaching reading. I knew in my heart it meant more choice for students, but the question of how to keep them accountable kept springing up. Both Gallagher and Miller provide great insights on how to delicately balance between meeting state requirements and providing what is best for our students. They clearly share how an educator can meet those state requirements while instilling a love for reading in the classroom.
It is clear that state-mandated testing is killing the love of education, period, but it is most certainly killing the love of reading. We cannot lose sight of what we need as a nation - a population of good readers. Reading brings about knowledge and knowledge, my friends, is power.
If you have not already read these two books, and you teach reading, I highly recommend you do so - IMMEDIATELY! We cannot allow "readicide" to continue happening throughout our nation. By doing so, we continue to widen the achievement gap between us and the top education nations in the world (Finland and Singapore).
So, will it be worth my while to do the summer book club again next year? ABSOLUTELY! I say that without hesitation. Now that I'm armed with knowledge about how to prevent "readicide" in my classroom, I know without a shadow of a doubt that next year our book club will be bigger and better because I'm setting my classes up for success in creating good readers - ones who will love to read not in spite of me, but because of me. My goal will be twenty students, but anything more than that will be icing on the cake.
There are three things I think about when posed with the issue of creating a more literate class. First, unlike the countries who are leaps ahead of the US, we do not have the privilege of dealing with a society of parents who value education. Instead, we are faced with many households that don’t have books. This is a personal challenge for me: expose students to the written word in order to find wisdom and enjoyment in their world. Secondly, I do not want to teach to a test. However, not only am I judged as teacher based on test scores, but in the world of budget crunching I could, at some point and time, be fired if my scores are not where the politicians have deemed they need to be. This brings me to another goal: I need to maintain test scores without killing the desire to read/write. Finally, my third thought has to do with technology. I do not think we need technology to communicate, collaborate, teach, or learn. Yet, many students and educators do not know how to accomplish these things without technology. In addition, society has made us so dependent on technology; I feel we are on the verge of giving up human interaction. This is disturbing to me, but again, I’ve made it a mission to teach with and without the technological advancements of the world. I actually have a note to delete my Twitter account because I don’t need it. It may be a benefit to me, but it is also a consumption of my time and brain, both of which I often think are overloaded.
ReplyDeleteI’m thankful for the educators (like you) who are willing to debate and share their experience. Perhaps together we can make a difference and teach in a world that is full of struggle and politics.