Book reports / reviews / whatever you wish to call them ... I need ideas!

[Janie]

Teaching in a traditional classroom doesn't afford the way we used to read books during our homeschooling days. Book "reports" are just part of the nature of the beast of classrooms as a way to assess and evaluate whether the student read the book and how well he read it.

 

So, I'm looking for innovative ideas of assessment -- ones that don't take up a lot of classtime, nor a lot of student time. I've used lots of different things over these classroom years, rarely ever the same.

 

Sometimes, I hand out a simple form to fill out in class: title, author, number of pages, number of pages *read*, names of main characters, describe the problem, describe a favorite scene, would you suggest this book to a friend?, why or why not did you enjoy the book?

 

Other times, I use more elaborate reports.

 

The bad thing about all this is that I want to students to learn to enjoy reading for the sake of reading, not to try to get an "A" on a report or to stress-out on writing one. I think it is so easy to kill the desire to read by requiring all this additional busywork.

 

I have seriously thought of requiring a book to be read, requiring a simple form to be completed with basic info (title, author, pages) with a pledge for them to sign regarding number of pages read. To be fair in grading toward those who really do the work and those who lie that they've done the work, I've thought about NOT recording any of the grades for those "reports." Students will think they are recorded because they are graded, but they have no idea what is actually recorded.

 

Ideas??

 

Thanks!

 

BTW, I call all of these reading assignments IRAs since they are investments. But IRA stands for Independent Reading Assignment. :)

[NanceXToo]

We've done things like:

 

Make a storyboard

Make a comic strip from one of your favorite scenes

Draw a picture of one of your favorite scenes

Write a new ending to the story (or add a new adventure)

Write a letter to one of the characters about his/her behavior

Answer these few questions about the story

Pretend you are a reporter on the scene describing one of the events in the story "as it happens" (can even video record this)

 

Sometimes we've done the plain old "write what the book was about" kind of thing, or "describe the main characters, the plot and the setting."

 

And sometimes I think plain old discussion does a lot, too!

 

Other ideas: act out a skit/scene like a little play, draw the main characters, maybe come up with some sort of craft or recipe relevant to the book.

 

I don't assign "grades" as of now. I didn't last year for 4th grade and don't intend to this year for 5th.