A Week of Building a Reading Life Success Stories Post 1

So, I have really got to get better at blogging. I'm going to try to commit to smaller posts 5 or so times a week. Let's see how this goes.

In an earlier post, I talked about Lucy Calkins' new Reading Units of Study. The first unit is called "Building a Reading Life" and boy have we built a reading life in my classroom this year. Students are reading like crazy. Teaching at a year round school, I always request/require that each student reads one book over break. When I told students this on our last day, they just about choked on their disgust at my suggestion. "I've got way more books to read than one!" "Well excuse me," I replied. "Read as much as you can! :)" I can't wait to see how many of them read more than one book and if they were able to maintain their reading life without the influence of classroom independent reading time, partner talks, and getting to tell me about their reading.

So, this week, I will share reasons I think "Building a Reading Life" has been successful.

Reason # 1: I have to give this first spot to my students. My 4th graders are so sweet, easily influenced, glued to books. Although I feel like they walked in this way, many parents are telling me that they have noticed a tremendous change in their child's attitude towards books. I will take some credit because I didn't just talk about reading life for a day or two and move on (but dedicated a whole nine weeks to it), but I am not comfortable taking all the credit. What if my students weren't so moldable, you might ask? Stay tuned for some ways I have helped struggling readers "build a reading life" this year.