I Love Books! #35

The first question under your "Blog Prompts" is a great question! What do I observe in our library? I see students wandering in the aisles - the few we have! They are almost over stimulated by the many book spines they see and have great difficulty picking a book. They are more apt to pick a book they have already read because they know what to expect and they know they finished that book once so they most likely can finish it again. The idea of reading a new book is very challenging. Every student has to check out a book. I have discovered the books stay in the class tub the entire week and are returned unread. The days of keeping a book on the corner of your desk are gone!! There are a few students who enjoy reading. They like suggestions from me and are more apt to try a new book. In my last book order, I included a large number of books considered high interest/low reading level. I also have shelf labels to point out where favorite authors are. On the counter, books are in a display organized by lexile. Anything that I can do to eliminate at least 1 step in the book-choosing process! I'm not sure if the tools I looked at would help or not. Students love being able to work on computers and at least they read! It isn't quality reading (my opinion) but is a start. I spent quite a bit of time on the Children's Books sites. LookyBook is gone!! Others were okay - seemed to be really old books or obscure titles. I guess the biggies are hanging on to that copyright. I may try the Children's Digital Library and read a book using my laptop and a projector. Maybe. I did enjoy reading Beatrix Potter though! I already have Living Social on my Facebook. It appears that I am in a one-way conversation with myself and my book reviews. I posted a question tonight and it will be interesting to see if anyone of my 10 friends replies!!! All in all, we are smack in the middle of a generation of kids who appear to be very comfortable hopping from one site to the next as they read or IM in short bursts. What it says about our future ability to concentrate on anything for a prolonged period of time has me worried. (they will be running the nursing home I'm in, for crying out loud!) For me, there will never be a substitute for carrying around a book, brushing my hand across the cover, and turning to the first page! Of my 4 children, 3 love to read, as in real books. My rebel child reads because she has to. It will be interesting to watch her as she grows! Will she finally enjoy a good book when she is out of college? I doubt it, but you never know. My goal is still to help each student find that one "aha" book. You know it. It's the one that you ended up saying "Aha, there is another world on these pages. Let me in!"