Book Clubs and Literature Circles

I have had a few questions about the books I have used during my book clubs.  The first thing I do before I start a book club is to round up a few book sets in the genre we are focusing on.  This can be tough since my school has a very small collection and I also have a small collection.  So I reserve book sets at the local library which I have two different counties very close so I use both.

It can be a lot of work but I love watching the kids' eyes light up when I bring the books sets into the classroom.  They get so excited so it is worth it.   I then present the class with the choices and they write down on a piece of paper or in the Google Classroom they submit a doc. I form groups and away we go.  Here is their groups from last year...

My book clubs each revolve around different genres.

Realistic Fiction: Hatchet, Stargirl,  and Bridge to Terabithia Each day we answered comprehension questions I created in our interactive notebooks.  This was a lot of work and collecting notebooks to grade.  Boo!   I do not think the kids enjoyed it as much either.  They did enjoy completing activities from a student choice board (Click here for TpT product) for the final assessment.    

Mystery - Westing Games, Bunnicula, and Library Card  I had the kids form a more formal literature circle. I used a Literature Circle Booklet with roles they completed each day and they shared the next day before they read.  I also used audio books with this book club.

Biography -I was a bit crazy here, I had each student pick out their own biography to read.  I did recommend the Who Was / Is? series but they could pick something different as long as it was a biography and they could finish it in 2 weeks.  So everyone read independently in class.  I would like to group / partner kids up this coming year.  Hmmmm maybe kids that read books on the same person could partner up to do a final project together.

Whole Class Read - The Best Christmas Pageant Ever - This book we read together right before Christmas Break.  I would put up on the Smartboard a roaring fire in a fireplace and we would read either as a class, partners or alone. Each day we would fill out a sticky note with 2 things we read and one question.  The next day we would discuss our sticky notes. They really loved this book and we did watch the movie and compared the two.  Warning the book and movie does use the word, "sex" in it.  Hmph why do the authors do that to a great book!  I may not use this next year because of that. I wonder if there is a "clean" version or better yet maybe I can White Out the word in all the books.  LOL

Historical Fiction - Number the Stars, Bud Not Buddy, and The Year of the Boar and Jackie Robinson I used another Literature Circle Packet on TpT this was my favorite plus it is free! I will be using this next year.

Fantasy - James and the Giant Peach - This was a whole class read at the end of the year.  This kids loved it.  Each day we read either together, partners or alone.  After they read the daily section I had them fill out a sticky note with 2 things they read about and 1 question.  This was then placed in their interactive notebook. The final project I had them do a report on their favorite characters.  Just a warning this book does have swearing in it. Why do these children authors have to have swearing in their stories?

Mythology - I assigned each group a short story (myth) in a book club format.  Here is the packet I found on TpT Greek Mythology.  It was awesome!

I also did a poetry unit and worked on close reading.  I think I forgot a few things but this is definitely the gist of each.  Here is independent reading repsonse sheets I created for next year's book clubs in my TpT store.

Available in my TpT Store

What do you do for reading?  What are your favorite books that you use in your classroom?

Happy Monday!