Book Club Plus comparison

I see many representations of the Book Club Plus model in my second grade classroom. Although the students each have a reading book called Storytown, along with the rest of the school, it has not been used as anything other than a resource for them to use when they finish tasks early. For example, if children finish their morning work they are allowed to pull out their Storytown books and silently read. I am actually very thankful for this because I feel that my CT does a great job choosing texts that relate to the theme of each week. Also, because these Storytime texts are not forced upon the students, they seem to really enjoy reading them during the few extra minutes before transitions.

As mentioned earlier, our school uses the Radner model’s weekly learning priorities in which each week there is a certain focus or theme. I feel that my CT does a great job of picking texts that both go along with this focus as well as explore content that is meaningful to primary-grade children and specific enough to provide questions for discussion, as the BCP recommends.Our time for Read Alouds has a designated time and place as the BCP suggests which is every morning, after our morning meeting,on the carpet. During this carpet time the children have to both listen and speak. My CT lets them know whether she will allow them to ask/answer questions along the way or if she is going to read the book all the way through first and then go back to discuss.We also talk about the difference between an author and an illustrator and the genre of the book. For example, this week is all about predictions and my CT began by reading the first few pages of Flat Stanley and then stopping and making a prediction of what would happen next. The class talked about whether or not they agreed with her prediction before she started to read again. Later she stopped and asked the students to write a one sentence prediction of their own, as well as a picture of what they thought would happen next. My CT often gives the children opportunities to talk about the text, or “think alouds” in which they make connections, inferences, and predictions. The focus or theme of each week draws on the week before so for that reason students are able to make connections between the book we are reading one day and one we have read the day or week before. In this area, my CT keeps a book shelf that holds only the books we have read for Read Alouds so that the children are able to view what we have read as a class which also makes it easier for them to refer back to during discussions. There have been a few books that we have read more than once, each time with a specific purpose and we usually always have some sort of an extension that occurs from a Read Aloud. Every week so far we have done a graphic organizer in which the students have to recall three characters from the text, illustrate an important part of the story and then write a summary that includes who, what and why.

One part of BCP that I really agree with and happen to witness in my classroom is students having ownership of literacy. Each student in my second grade has their own book box with their name on it. Students are allowed to visit my CT’s personal library to pick out five books, using the five finger rule, to store in their box. During D.E.A.R, students are instructed to grab their boxes and bring them to their desk. I really love that the students get to pick not only one, but five texts of their own to read and you can tell they like it as well. My CT’s library is also an element of the classroom that I really like. It is in a corner of the classroom and includes over twenty bins that are labeled according to themes and genres, which makes it really easy for the children to look for books that interest them. There is a very diverse quantity of books and each one has a card inside, the kind you would find if you were to check out a book from the real library, which allows the students to take these texts home.

Each afternoon we also set aside time for Writers Workshop, in which each table is responsible for a bin that contains dictionaries, a thesaurus, and a folder for each student. In this folder is a booklet of three pages where the children are to write about the beginning, middle and end of a small moments story. We come back to these booklets every day for the students to reread, edit, and add more detail. Students are also responsible for keeping a Reading log and readers response journals. The reading log is kept in their individual book box and when a student has finished reading a book, they write the title, circle whether it was fiction/nonfiction, label it as hard, easy or just right, and then put a smiley face or frown to indicate if they enjoyed it. In their readers response journals, students take their opinion one step further by writing about the book that they are currently reading or one that they have just finished. If they are still reading the text they may make inferences or predictions and if they have finished reading, they can tell what they liked most about the book, summarize it or take it one step further and write what they think will happen next.

The one element of the BCP model that I have yet to see in my classroom is group reading. My CT is still very busy finishing STEP assessments for each of the students and until she can complete this, she doesn’t feel comfortable grouping the class. Once she is aware of everyone's reading level, she plans to incorporate daily guided reading and centers that include opportunities for children to read together or what she calls “buddy” reading. I feel really fortunate to be in a classroom in which the students have many opportunities throughout the day to read and write as well as view and discuss literacy.