The Book Whisperer

This week I read the book, The Book Whisperer: Awakening the Inner Reader in Every Child by Donalyn Miller.  Ms. Miller’s background is of a sixth grade Language Arts and Social Studies teacher in Texas.

She discusses her struggles her first couple of years of teaching in not being able to get students engaged in reading in order to become life- long readers.  She finally realized that in order for students to enjoy reading they needed to have time to read.  She therefore devoted a portion of her class time to where the students just read their books. 

 Now these books weren’t books that were assigned to be read, they were actually books that each individual student got to choose for themself.  There were some stipulations as to the different genres they had to read as well as the total amount of books read during the year.  Her goal for them was 40 books for the year.  Most of her students found that number outrageous, but in the end, they came to love reading and some of them read even more than 40 books that year.

The freedom to choose their own books versus being assigned the same book for the entire class seemed to be the strongest influence in them becoming life-long readers. “Providing students with the opportunity to choose their own books to read empowers and encourages them. It strengthens their self-confidence, rewards their interests, and promotes a positive attitude toward reading by valuing the reader and giving him or her a level of control.  Readers without power to make their own choices are unmotivated.”

 Unmotivated. That seems to be the word that best describes a good portion of my students that I see as a librarian.  I keep asking myself: What can I do to try and get these students interested in reading?  I would love it if we had time where they could just come in and read a book.  I would love to be able to know all of my students well enough to be able to give individual recommendations.  Unfortunately, I have over 700 students that I see on a weekly basis.

I must admit that when she started talking about student surveys, I got very excited. I kept trying to think of a way that I could do that with my students.  I have some ideas and I’m still working on it, but if I can make it happen, I just might be doing that.

Reading this book really energized me and made me remember my passion for reading and how I would love nothing more than to get my students excited about reading.  To me, reading can take you anywhere and sometimes anywhere is better than where you are.