For the Love of REELy Great Books

If I had to check a box describing my relationship with reading as a classroom teacher, it would have to be It’s Complicated. I teach sixth grade in a Title I elementary school that was in school turnaround for a decade, meaning my colleagues and I doggedly implemented fluency and comprehension strategies in our classrooms that, by design, sacrificed our children’s love of reading for a chance at exiting turnaround. So, of course, we didn’t.

Then came the pandemic, which devastated literacy learning in beautifully diverse, culturally rich schools like ours. At the same time, I dug deep into the research supporting book clubs as an effective literary classroom practice. They boost student engagement and motivation with dialogue and discourse, improve comprehension and critical thinking, and nurture a lifelong passion for reading – so I decided to give it a shot…and was immediately overwhelmed by the thought of selecting all the titles I’d need to make it work!

Thankfully, a year ago I discovered Kwame Alexander Bookfest, which provided me with a curated collection of titles that resonate with students from diverse backgrounds like mine. The themes in these books are universal, and yet they speak directly to the lived experiences of my students, who are reflected in Bookfest’s incredible cast of multicultural characters. I decided to dive in and did all the important book-clubby things: I supplied enough copies of each book, established norms and group roles, built time into our schedule for students to independently read their book club books, and provided sentence frames to help structure student-led discussions and keep them respectful. I met with each group two to three times a week during my Tier II reading block to discuss each story’s plot, the author’s craft, and the connections the students were making between these books, other texts they’d read, and their own personal lives.

When my students finished their books, we weren’t ready for the fun to stop. My kids are well-known for creating videos they share on our YouTube channel, 9thEvermore, so as an extension activity I challenged them to develop video projects that would elevate these books they had loved reading so much. Ultimately, every group got excited about the same project: book recommendations that would convince my next class of sixth graders to pick their book over all the rest! Each video had to be shorter than 1.5 minutes because that’s the maximum length of a Reel on Instagram, hence the title they chose for this activity – REELy Great Books!

Here are the steps your students can follow, like mine, to create a REELy Great Book recommendation:

1. Students write a script as a group that introduces the book, describes a few interesting plot points (no spoilers!), and provides enticing insights into the book’s themes, characters, and motivations.
2. Students choose at least two representatives from their group to record themselves performing the script on camera. If it helps, they can read the words off a teleprompter app like my students did on my smartphone.
3. Help students edit the best bits from the different performances together to create a single video. Include an image of the book’s cover, some royalty-free music, and voilà, your students’ REELy Great Book recommendations are complete!

This week, my new class of sixth graders just began watching the videos made by last year’s class, and the competition for top selection based on the recommendations has been fierce. Scan the QR codes to check out my students’ two favorites and decide for yourself which you’re more excited to read. 

And if you want more information about effectively running book clubs in your space, check out this webinar called, Enriching Learning with Book Clubs: Perspectives from a Classroom Teacher and a Librarian with me and media specialist Carrie Friday. I hope you’ll join us!

John Arthur

Elementary Teacher
Meadowlark Elementary, Salt Lake City, Utah

John Arthur is the 2021 Utah Teacher of the Year and 2021 National Teacher of the Year Finalist. Now in his tenth year of teaching, his students have gained national recognition as advocates for children and immigrants like them through music videos and other content they create and share across platforms as @9thEvermore. Arthur is also the co-director of the Utah Teacher Fellows and an adjunct professor in the Graduate School of Education at Westminster College.