March is National Reading Month,
starting with the NEA's "Read Across America." Looking for ideas to
inspire a life-long love of books? Here are reading response
activities, interactive ELA (English language arts) lessons, book-based crafts
and literature response lessons. Book activities are hands-on,
multi-sensory, cross-curricular Montessori-style. Use for interactive Readers
Workshop, special education students, reluctant readers, divergent learners and
summer reading enrichment.
Reading
response journal. Have kids create personalized reading logs, respond to
literature and complete book-based activities. Check my blog Free Lesson Plans 4U and Free Printable Lesson Plans for tips to make literature response journals
and activity suggestions. Here are free printable reading activitiesand calendar tracker from PBS.
Homemade
books. Cut book covers from cereal box. Cover with scrap wrapping paper or
wallpaper. Cover with magazine picture collage. Decoupage by painting pictures
with watered-down school glue, front and back. Cut lined paper pages (for text)
and blank paper (for illustrations). Or use scrap paper and draw in text lines.
Book-based
promotional materials. Have kids play marketer for their favorite book or
author. Make posters, book covers advertising literature. Create 3-D
sculptures, models or dioramas based on books. Make book-based merchandise:
toys, snacks, food, games. In homeschooling, my 6th grade son designed a
"Hobbit Holes" cereal box designed on his favorite J.R.R. Tolkien
novel.
Book
diorama. Create scenes from books using recycled products. Arrange scene in
shoe box. Use small dolls (Lego, Fisher-Price, Little Tikes, Polly Pockets) as
characters.
Story-reading
audio/video presentations. Make audio recordings of kids reading books. Covert
to mp3 files for iPod. Videotape students reading and story-telling. Upload
videos to Youtube.
Story-telling.
Students read aloud to younger students. Students act out children's books and
present to younger or special needs classes. In high school, our oldest
daughter acted out a Shel Silverstein's poem "Noise Day" for special
education kids. They loved when she skateboarded across the stage!
Book-music
connections. Create music playlists based on books. Select metaphorical songs.
Kids will love choosing modern songs to represent story themes. Our family saw
a production of "Macbeth." The play was set to Lady Gaga's "Bad
Romance," "The Decemberists "This is Why We Fight" and
"Ain't No Rest for the Wicked" by Cage the Elephant. It really
resonated with students and helped them understand and relate to Shakespeare.
For
more reading response activities, visit my blog Kidz Literature.
