Celebrating a Year of Reading

The independent reading program I implemented this year was hands-down my favorite part of the year. I tried and failed to implement independent reading for years. Once grades were out of the way, we had the space to read what we wanted, when we wanted—we were developing rich reading lives. (Obviously, many people have thriving independent reading programs with traditional grading. I just couldn’t make it work. That’s a me problem. You do you.)

Someday soon, I will write some posts on starting and maintaining an independent reading program. (Spoiler: Read Book Love by Penny Kittle. That’s all you really need.)  But since it’s April and most teachers are thinking about “wrap-up” activities, I wanted to share some celebration ideas.

1. Reading Ladders

Speaking of Penny Kittle, she has a brilliant assignment that she calls a Reading Ladder. She has examples of assignment sheets on her website, but the basic idea is to have students organize the books they read from least to most difficult and to include a rationale for their choices. I suggest spending some time in class discussing the different ways in which books can be challenging (length, vocabulary, genre, content, structure, etc.). I did this assignment after the first semester. In addition to the ladders, I asked my students to write a reflection about the book that had the most impact on their growth as readers and HOW it changed them. Here are two examples from my AP Language class:

2. Flipgrid favorites

One of my colleagues is working on a video celebration project because, as she says, “They’re just so cute when they’re talking about books they loved. They get so excited.” I love this. I know that whenever I hear someone talk about a book they enjoyed, I get excited about it, too. All it takes is an enthusiastic tone and someone saying, “This was a great book,” and I put it right on my Goodreads list.

Together, we developed the assignment below. You can download a free copy here. I’ve included a page with blank space for you to add your own directions.

3. My Unputdownables

A few weeks ago, a colleague asked for some help getting independent reading going. She doesn’t read much YA, so she needed some recommendations. I said, “My students can help.” I made a Google sheet and invited all my students to recommend their “unputdownables” from the year on this list. They added brief descriptions and linked Goodreads’ summaries. 

As an end-of-year celebration, I want to take this one step further and turn it into a shared slideshow: something my present and future students can use to find next reads. Something my students can look back on to remember this crazy year where, in spite of all the obstacles, we managed to build an amazing community of readers.  

Here is a slideshow template you could use. Or you could invite students to design their own slides and add them to a slideshow that you have already started and shared. The image on the right is an example of a slide my student created of books she read third quarter.

Give the students editing access if you want them to add the slides themselves. If you’re not comfortable with that, have them submit the slides separately, and you can add them and share it as a viewable slideshow.

4. My Year in Books Reading Portfolio

This one was designed to encourage the students to reflect on their year of reading: how they grew as readers and as people through the books they read and the goals they set. I’ve designed it as a slideshow with one slide per book, but this could be adapted in many ways. (Get your own editable copy here.) You could ask the students to think about different ways to group the books and make shelves for each grouping (with each shelf being a slide). You could also ask them to design their own slideshow based on whatever parameters you want to set. I like the idea of inviting them to think about how each book changed them. 

5. #summerreadinggoals

Finally, what better way to celebrate a year of reading than to think about all the delicious books we’ll have time to read over the summer? Keep the momentum of your independent reading program going by inviting the students to set summer reading goals. I can think of so many fun ways to do this. Students could make their own slideshows, or you could do one large shared slideshow for an entire class.

Another idea is to make a #summerreadinggoals Padlet. All year long I encourage my students to add their favorite books to a Padlet board that is shared among all of my classes, and they love doing this! They take pride in contributing something to a wider audience, and they enjoy sharing books with each other. With Padlet, it’s also really easy to add links. (My students link to summaries on Goodreads, which automatically imports an image of the book cover). And they can interact by leaving comments on each other’s posts. The basic version of Padlet is free. 

If you use any of these ideas, I would love to hear about how it went. Feedback helps all of us become better!