High school

Reading Challenge – Promoting a Reading Culture

/ gravescolleen / 2 Comments

I’ve had a couple of requests via Instagram and Twitter to explain my 2017 Reading Challenge. This reading challenge started as a way to increase reading on my campus and hopefully facilitate growing our reading culture.

Background on Reading Challenge

In December, Carol Richmond the awesome librarian at Wilson Elementary, sent out an email about Reading Challenge that she was sharing with her staff. I loved the IDEA and quickly decided to adapt it for my high school students and teachers!

The challenge is to read outside of your normal reading zone. For my high schoolers, the challenge is to just get them reading! I also thought it would be good to challenge our teachers to read and share what they are reading on a regular basis. I’m planning on sending out a monthly email recapping what I read for the month and reminding my teachers of the different reading categories (and reminding them to submit reading responses via a Googleform on my library page.) My method is to pretty much hassle everyone to read all the time. 🙂

Here is a list of the categories (updated from Mrs. Richmond’s form to include high school reading materials like the TAYSHAS and Nerdy Book Club winners.)

Display

My first display is below, and I’m brainstorming ways I can update the Reading Challenge display by month… so if you have any ideas, let me know! I’m currently thinking of choosing a category  (recommended by a student) and making the whole display about that category. Plus I’ll update the “Reading Challenge” signage.

For this first display, I’ve included lots of categories and labeled what category each book will fill on small laminated speech bubbles.

I was hoping to make our Google Form for submitting reads more accessible by creating this QR code bookmarks. For teachers, reminding via email seems to work the best.

Submitting Reads

For students, I’ve also got the link to submit books open on a Chromebook right next to our dropbox. (Which also happens to be a Makey Makey Minion)

Promoting Reading and the Library

Favorite Books?
Another idea I’ve had for promoting a reading culture is to take pics of teachers and students reading their favorite books and posting these around our campus. Or maybe rotating “Currently reading” slides on our Google Slide announcements.
I think small quick displays seem to work the best for getting students to pick up new books. So I’m excited to copy this idea from The Daring Librarian for the “student recommendation” category for the next Reading Challenge Display.
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How do you promote a reading culture in your library?

Wrap Up 2016-Top Posts and #makered Publications

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Top 10 Most Popular Posts for Readers

These are the most visited posts written during 2016!

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My Favorite Posts

With two books behind me, I’m looking forward to posting more project ideas on this blog. Some of my favorite posts this year are project oriented and some of them are theory. Here are a few of my favorite that you may not have seen yet.

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Articles and Book Published in 2016

The Big Book of Makerspace Projects came out in October 2016. It’s been a blast to see its warm reception by makers and librarians alike. Aaron and I would love to see what you are making from it, so make sure you tag your creations with #bigmakerbook to share with our growing maker community!

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To Be Published 2017

Maker Theory Book

Aaron and I have TWO books coming out in 2017! First a theory book that led to a lot of interviews with great tinkerers, makers, and librarians co-written with the awesome Diana Rendina. It should be out late summer and is being published by ABC Clio.

Challenge- Based Learning in the School Library Makerspace

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Maker Project Book

Aaron and I are having a blast making and combining project ideas for this Makey Makey focused book that will be a part of the Evil Genius series published by TAB DIY (a McGraw Hill imprint)! Projects will range from simple to complex and really take you and your Makey Makey #beyondthebanana! You can pre-order the book now, but you’ll have to wait until the summer to start Makey Makey-ing these projects!

20 Makey Makey Projects for the Evil Genius

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