Improving Summer Reading

Original Post 5/9/13

As I can see the finish line for the end of the year, I am beginning to think about summer reading.  In the past I have had some students who read lots of books and are eager to share what they read in the beginning of the year.  As an educator, I never seem to provide students with the platform the should have to take pride in all the work they did during the summer.  This is something I want to improve.  I also have students who do not read very much and one of their reasons is they don't know what books to choose at the library.  I wanted to develop a way to help these students as well.  Here is my three part plan:

Part 1:  Animoto Accounts

Before the last day of school I will set up Animoto accounts for all my new students.  I will not be able to teach them how to make the Animoto book trailers, but I will show them some examples and where they can go to watch how-to videos.  I am hoping this will give students who do read a sense of pride in their work.

Part 2:   Animoto Data-Base

This is the first year I have used Animoto in my classroom.  We do it so I can document a student has actually read a book, and as a way for students to to see if they are interested in a book another 5th-grader recommends.  Now that we seem to have solid collection of book-trailers some of my students are helping me to archive them in a Google Doc that can be seen here.  Now students over the summer can watch book trailers to find a book that might interest them.

Part 3:  Class Blog

Our class blog will be ready to go by the last day of school.  On the blog I will have a calendar with weekly topics for students to write about.  It will also allow students the opportunity to document what they have read, and a place where students can access the book trailer data-base.  I will leave some examples of former student's book trailers, and will allow former students to still access our blog.

Let's hope these changes make a difference in the reading students do over the summer.