ABQmom Posted March 21, 2008 Share Posted March 21, 2008 A friend of mine will be homeschooling her dc next year--pulling them out of PS. She was asking me about book clubs. She said that her ds participates in several affiliated with his school and just loves doing it. He basically just reads a book and then takes a quiz on it. She was wondering if there was anything similar to this for homeschoolers. The only thing that I know about is the Pizza Hut book it program. Does anyone know of such a book club for homeschoolers? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mom to 3+1 Posted March 21, 2008 Share Posted March 21, 2008 It's a mom and son club, started by another mother. we meet about every 1 1/2, the boys read a book and answer a few questions (pre-determined and in a binder from the start of the group) and color a picture of their favorite scene. then we all get together and the mom's direct a short (30-40min) conversation, answering the questions and a little moral discussion, and then they play. It has been great for my son, he is hs for the first time this year and it is with his ps friends and 1 new hs friend. Also, each boy hosts the club and when they are host, they pick the book. My only wish is that we had a master list to choose from, I am a little concerned for upcoming subject matter because not all the mom's feel as I do and about conservative topics (ie. no talk about drugs, war or sex - keep in mind their ages) and good literature! hope this idea helps. Laura Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dfrecore Posted March 21, 2008 Share Posted March 21, 2008 Right now, our Barnes & Noble has a bookclub for girls, where they're reading the American Girls series. They get together once a month, discuss the current choice, and then do a craft. I know that Borders has some as well (for adults always, kids sometimes), and the library has quite a few. I think that you would just have to make sure the book in question was appropriate for your kid. A lot of times they do a series, which makes it a little easier to judge if you're interested, plus if your kid is really into that series, they can make friends with others who are also interested in that. I imagine they'll be close in age, but not exactly the same, which is also fine with me! Danika Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Beth in Central TX Posted March 21, 2008 Share Posted March 21, 2008 I'm not aware of a national book club for homeschoolers, but you can always set up a group for your local students. There's a group of ladies that meet at Barnes & Noble once a month where I live. It's a great way for me to read literature based books and discuss them with others. Last summer, a local book club was organized for late elementary and early logic age students (not all of them were homeschooled), one for boys and one for girls. Appropriate books were selected and then a leader guided activites and discussion about the book each week. I think we did 6 books total. The boys met at a local McDonald's. I bought my boys a small milkshake, and they would sit at a table and talk about the book. It was a great experience for them. The book club leader for the boys group was a teenage boy that was formerly homeschooled. He did a great job keeping the boys interested in the discussion, and he was a great role model for them all. My oldest son mentioned that he thought it was great that their leader would give up his summer break to teach them. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Josie Posted March 21, 2008 Share Posted March 21, 2008 Book Adventures might work for her. It is an online "club" where you read books and take a quiz online. You earn points for prizes. She could do this with other homeschoolers if she wanted more of a club atmosphere. http://http://www.bookadventure.org/ki/index.asp Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dirty ethel rackham Posted March 21, 2008 Share Posted March 21, 2008 What we have done is invite several families together as a club. We decide on the books we will read. Then we take turns hosting and leading the discussions. Our book clubs are not comprehension/quiz based, but discussion based. We leave the comprehension issues to the individual families. We have had some interesting discussions. We have one group that started when the boys were around 4th grade. Now we are moving on to high school with this same group. It has been wonderful! I have a 2nd boy who is in a group of mostly 6th graders. I am hoping to start one for my 2nd grade daughter in another year or so. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
javamama Posted March 21, 2008 Share Posted March 21, 2008 Homeschoolers can participate in the Pizza Hut Book-it and get the free pizzas. They need to sign up now for next fall. www.bookitprogram.com The enrollment deadline is June 13th. edited after I re-read the original post. I think you already knew about Book-it. Never mind. 8-D Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MichelleWI Posted March 21, 2008 Share Posted March 21, 2008 Josie's link is a little wonky. Here it is ... Edit: Trying again ... BookAdventure.org (I don't know anything about the site. Just trying to get a working link in here. LOL) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Carol in Cal. Posted March 21, 2008 Share Posted March 21, 2008 I don't care for those early 'comprehension' questions that focus children on whether or not they noticed little details like what color someone's dress was. I like narrating / summarizing in the early years. For that you read a hardish book, a chapter a day, and then summarize at the beginning of each session what you had read so far. Gradually you transition to having the child do the summary. (It is verbal, cuddly, and informal.) In parallel, we formed a small group and used the Junior Great Books curriculum to encourage close reading, word study, and developing and discussion interpretive questions. This curriculum is written for a classroom, but is very well suited for use in a small group--maybe 4-8 children. The passages and stories start to become a little problematic at about level 6, IMO. I think that we will stop this shortly; certainly I have de-emphasized it recently. This year I formed a group to study entire children's novels and teach and discuss literary elements. This has been wonderful. We are reading older works as well as modern ones, and I am carefully screening them. The discussions have been excellent, and I am finding that Dd is developing a repertoire of novels that she has deeply considered, and compares. So this has started a deeper mastery of these works for her. I use many of the questions in the WTM logic stage list. DD and I also discuss other works one on one, since the book group only meets every 3-5 weeks. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jenny in Atl Posted March 21, 2008 Share Posted March 21, 2008 We've done a bunch, either with HS groups, friends, and through local bk stores. I know a number of HS moms who have bk clubs themselves, meeting once a month for a mom's night out to discuss. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mcconnellboys Posted March 21, 2008 Share Posted March 21, 2008 Our local library system has book clubs for homeschoolers (and also after school book clubs that anyone can go to).... Some of them serve pizza; sometimes they read and discuss a book, then watch the movie version of it; some have associated trivia quizzes for prizes. It varies.... Regena Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WTMindy Posted March 21, 2008 Share Posted March 21, 2008 they choose a book to read and once a month get together for a craft/snack/discussion about the book. It is so cute. This month they did The Tale of Despereaux and it was my dd's turn to plan the craft/snack. I made cupcakes for them and bags of different colors of frosting and supplies for them to decorate the different characters from the book. They were very cute!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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