Baseball and books are two of my favourite things, so I am STOKED at the opportunity to bring them together in this post.
One of the fundamental questions for the Teacher Librarian (TL) and the English teacher is “How do you foster a reading culture?”
I am a “start with why” thinker. It seems obvious, but it’s worth stating that we want kids to read because literacy is the gateway to all learning. If we foster reading, we increase academic success.
So now we know our mission 🚀; how do we get there?
I am going to tell you about one of the greatest resource videos I ever came across: The Power of Reading, a lecture by Stephen Krashen, Professor Emeritus at USC. You know how you feel when you find something that you really love, and you feel like you have discovered some amazing, world-changing secret, and you just have to tell everyone? And then you find out everyone already knows about it? Such was my Stephen Krashen experience. Turns out I had “discovered” someone everyone else already knew about; the man is an oft-quoted expert and educational and linguistic legend. Yet he had somehow escaped my detection until a few years ago. If you are in the same boat, you’re welcome! If you are shaking your head in horror (How can you be an English teacher and not know who Stephen Krashen is?!)…
For the purpose of this post, I want to focus on one aspect of the Krashen video. It is simple, but it is brilliant: “When you give kids interesting things to read, they will read them” (UGACOE 2012). Quite simply, reading for pleasure improves reading.
Now for the baseball part! 🤗🤗🤗 Krashen talks about the concept of “the home run book.” Like a person learning to play baseball who falls in love with the game after experiencing the rush of their first home run, Krashen says one strong, positive reading experience can turn you into a reader. This rings true for me; I remember a student years ago who struggled to read. I gave him a high interest book called Suspicion Island. He loved it and came back asking for “more books like that one.” The next day I saw him in the library. He’d found his “homerun book” and he now knew he could read for pleasure.
So if reading leads to reading, how do we increase reading? Some ideas that I (or people smarter than I) have tried:
- As a TL, establish a collection that is diverse in every way—subject matter, ability level, fiction versus non-fiction, representation, genres, and text only versus text with visuals—so there are truly options for every student. As an English teacher, I suffered from the “this is what students should be reading” mindset. I now get that we need to focus instead on “this is what students want to be reading.” Field of Dreams famously taught us, ” If you build it they will come.” If you build a collection, they will read. (Baseball analogy #2, for those keeping score. Is that #3?)
- If you have a great collection with something for everyone, you need to get that message out. In my previous school, I was gifted prime bulletin board territory across from the office. I used it to make colourful displays to catch people’s eyes and let them know what they could find in the library. Sometimes I had a theme (scary books for October), or sometimes I simply built a display of new titles. Other times my bulletin board had a message so students knew they could find voices that spoke to them (or for them!), like the time I made a display of LGBTQ titles. It’s important, if your collection represents and includes all students, to tell them that. Of course some schools are blessed with display cases at their library. Use those too! And change them regularly so all kids can see the diversity in your library. And this is so important: include those high interest books and graphic novels so kids feel that they are valued and not just the lesser cousins of “the real books.” Krashen gives the example of Bishop Desmond Tutu who professed that his love of reading came from comic books. He also recommends Captain Underpants and Garfield to encourage reading. Personally, I have found that the most popular books in the library are the yearly Guinness Book of World Records, which feature spectacular visuals along with printed text. Bottom line: all books are cool! 😎
- A library should, of course, have a good digital presence. Not only is it a source of useful tools (databases, citation help), but it’s a great way to advertise the books. And Tweet. And post on the school website and Facebook page. Meet kids where they are.
- Now that you have your awesome inclusive collection and you’ve told people about it, you want to help them get their hands on the books they’re going to love reading. The best thing I’ve seen is genre-based filing. Books are sorted according to categories (and then filed alphabetically by author within that section) and colour-coded. If a kid knows they want to read about history, they know where to find books about history. If a kid wants to read comics or graphic novels, they know where to find comics and graphic novels. If a kid knows they like science fiction, but the science fiction is lost in a larger sea of fiction, it’s harder for that kid to connect with their “home run books.” The easier it is to find something they want to read, the more likely they are to read.
- I take a similar approach as an English teacher, such as with a recent challenging Literary Studies 11 class. Because I had control of the library budget, I had the luxury of ordering books that would eventually go to the library but could start in my classroom. I purchased $1000 worth of a wide assortment of graphic novels, covering hopefully every interest (superheroes, LGBTQ, history, technology, sports, family drama, high level literary fiction– don’t forget about the kids who already love to read!) and let my students select what they would read, without judgment. The kids who struggled with reading loved that there were high interest, accessible options. I remember one boy in particular who enthusiastically approached the selection of graphic novels and couldn’t help but say, “Cool!” when he saw Batman Returns was an option in English class. I didn’t need to prod, bribe, or threaten them to read, and to a kid, they all expressed how much they liked their books. I even had kids ask for another book! Grand slam!
- Of course building the collection isn’t the only infrastructure you need to create. You need to think about the space too. You want it to be inviting. You want it to be comfortable. You want people to want to come there. And like your collection, you want it to meet diverse needs. Some people want to curl up in a beanbag chair in the corner. Some want to chill on a couch. Some want to sit with their friends at a table. I love my current school library for this reason, and it is very much the heart of the school precisely because it offers something for everyone. Take a tour:
https://animoto.com/play/BLDc1aXxK6ptiCsvtOK12Q
- The most effective English teachers and TLs embrace technology as a partner in literacy. Last year in my classroom, my pedagogical focus was on UDL. If I want all students to succeed, I need to build my practice in a way that allows them to succeed. For literacy, this included embracing technology. Again, the traditional English teacher voice in my head was shouting at me about what reading looked like (a kid with a book in their hand). But all that mindset does is throw up a barrier for so many kids. Remember that kid whose face lit up when he saw Batman Returns? I’d seen that face before: for the first assigned reading in the course, I told them I had shared a YouTube link with them of an audio version of the story we were reading. Relief and joy. He put on his headphones and listened as he followed along with his book. At the end of the course, he thank me for “always letting him use the computer.” (Later I fumed that this was even worth mentioning for him; who wasn’t letting him use his computer?!) This kid was successful in my Literary Studies 11 class when he very well might not have been elsewhere. Likewise, I am now teaching with 1-to-1 iPad use, and kids are given access to eBooks, allowing use of a suite of handy tools: kids are encouraged to interact with the texts by highlighting key passages and making notes, they can instantly look up words they don’t understand, and they offer the read aloud feature. Interestingly enough, the 1-to-1 environment has meant that my UDL self was offering traditional paper books to the kids that wanted them. 🤪 The iPad tools may allow them to do more, but the most important thing for me is for them to be comfortable reading. And if they’re more comfortable with a “dead tree” (as my TL calls them), then give them a “dead tree.”
- Finally, when talking about “a culture of reading,” don’t forget about the culture part, the customs and habits of a group of people. You want reading to be a shared custom or habit. One great way is to leverage the technology. I have a colleague who gave me the great suggestion of using the app Goodreads with my students. This puts them right into a community of readers and allows them to interact with people who share their tastes and interests as well as to get recommendations for other “home run books.” There is also a book club in my school. They have a presence in the school via posters, school announcements, a table at “club day, and meetings with food (peanuts and cracker jacks?) to attract new members. Their interests are just as valued as athletics and the green club.
As baseball legend Willie Stargell once said, “When you start the game, they don’t say ‘Work ball!’ They say, ‘Play ball!’” (Bailey, 2022). If we want kids to read, there needs to be joy in it. Even I (with a degree in literature) feel like it’s work when I have to read something I don’t want to. But let me pick my book and I’ll get lost in it.
