Student selection of books

My current students have a wealth of literature to choose from. One big change I notice this year is that students are reading a mix of books from our class and the school library. Of course, my students overall are more academic than my students last year. I have an honors class that is excited about reading, which makes things much easier.

While it's great to have a group of students who are interested in reading, I am noticing a trend that goes to the other end of the spectrum than I am used to. Many students are wanting to read large books. This hits at one of the negatives about the AR program. I do not want to limit or restrict the books that students can read.

Students have asked if they can read a larger book, which may be worth 10-30 points. In relation, most of my students' goals are between 10-20. The hesitation about letting them read these books is that if they read it and don't pass the test, they could end up at the end of the grading period with no points.

What I've been suggesting to the students is to read these long books during our winter break. We have three weeks off in our district. My thought is that if they return and don't pass the test, they still have many weeks to read more and gain the points necessary to achieve their goals.

I am happy that most students are able to understand this situation. I let them know that I don't want to limit their reading. It's their learning, and I want them to be able to choose as much as is permitted by the program. One of the students took it one step further. She said, "I won't be able to check out new books during the break anyway. I should have one that I will be able to read for a long time."

AR 2009

I am very happy with the progress of my students this year. My students are excited about reading. They love the fact that they can get books from me and the library. They feel special because most students haven't had books to read all year. We've been without a librarian up until last week. My students were able to take advantage of my class library.

The quality of their reading logs has also improved. Many are writing very detailed sentences. I'm having more parent involvement as well. Most parents are signing them regularly. I had almost no participation on this aspect last year.

More importantly, the students are performing well on the quizzes. They are happy to receive their scores and I can tell it encourages them to read more.

I look forward to how much they may grow this year. I feel our system is in place, and that they are taking advantage of it.

Results

The results from my action research are mixed. While pouring over the reports, I found that students who had access to a classroom library read significantly more books than students who simply had access to the school library. I was hoping that would be the case. It seems logical. This hints that students may be more interested in learning. Or at least they would pick up a book if they had to walk right by it to leave my class.

Although the students with the class library read more, their reading level didn't increase as much as the class without the extra access. Students with access increased by an average of one grade level, while students who visited the library increased by a grade and a half.

This led me to more questions. I am curious about the increase in vocabulary by the students who read more books. Would this increase because they were introduced to more words in the varied literature? It also makes me think that I would have liked to have given both classes an additional reading level assessment to cross-check the validity of the STAR reading test that determined their reading level.

Multi-Cultural Aspect

The multi-cultural aspect of the research focuses on my students. At Carr Intermediate School, we are 99% Hispanic, and 85% are eligible for free or reduced lunch. The student body is a challenge to teach, but with current strategies, we have made exceptional gains in our CST scores the past few years.

This research is yet another tool to allow my students to succeed. This is my goal in teaching. I look forward to sharing more of the proccess and results with you here on this blog.

My Action Research Project Context

My school has implemented the Accelerated Reader program to track our students' reading levels and library books read. After using the program for a year, I noticed how difficult it was to get students to visit our library to get new books inbetween classroom visits. There was little motivation on their part to get new books.

Our school gave us money to purchase in-class libraries. I asked the students what types of books they would like to read, then I bought them. My class was one of the few that purchased our books from Scholastic rather than our vendor that supplies the library. It was a good thing-the library vendor delivered the books one week before school ended, while my students had access to the books for half the year!

My action research question is this: Will students read more if they have access to an in-class library rather than a traditional school library?

Ultimately, I want to know if using classtime to visit the library can be avoided if students can get books directly from my class. This would free up many instructional minutes that are used while students choose books and travel to and from the library.