The students challenge themselves as to how many books they can read over a three-month period - so the "battle" is with themselves...
They can choose any book on our Bookworm list - these are books that we already have in our library that we have selected for this programme and there are about 300.
The book list divides the books into different genres.
When a student has read eight books (and done a book report and oral on each), she receives a certificate from the head in assembly, and for every eight thereafter. (Last year, one girl read 32 books!)
They have to read from 8 different genres and 8 different authors for a certificate, so it’s a wonderful way to them to explore different genres.
We hold a prizegiving at the end of the period where we award the top readers in each class as well as readers who have benefitted most from the programme.
If we get new books in that are suitable for the programme, then we add these to the list.
I put up a display for them for the whole three months that they can help themselves to, usually focusing on a different genre every couple of weeks.
The launch of the Battle of the Bookworms, our Grade 8 reading programme, has seen our junior selection of books flying out of the library! Here is how it works:
This is great, thank you! A quick question: you say they can't read from more than one genre for a certificate. Does this mean all 8 books must be one genre? Or am I misunderstanding? We've just completed a 6 month Big Book Battle with one English and one Afrik Grade 11 class, using 8 Eng and 4 Afrik books. It was quite successful and we'll be repeating it with a few tweaks. A HUGE thank you for your inspiration! Rose at Somerset College, Somerset West
ReplyDeleteI've changed the way I worded that sentence about the genres - doesn't really make sense! Basically, they must read from 8 different genres - and 8 different authors. I've had an idea for next year's programme - I am going to make a clock face with the different genres around it, and they can spin the hand of the clock to choose their next genre - might be fun!
DeleteHi Philippa, just to follow up. We're just finishing our Grade 8 competition, mostly like yours so once again a shout out for your inspiration and for doing the original work! We had one student challenge himself to read 40 books, and this week he has read his 40th! Crazy. It's been good to help me get to know some more students as I don't teach them. Almost half of them met or exceeded their personal challenge and 6 of them managed at least one lot of 8 in 8 genres. Only 6 students didn't read a book. So not a bad first time, and I hope to do it again next year. I like your spin the clock idea!
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