Reading + Snacking = Fun!

Today I hosted the first ever meeting of The Page Turners - a reading club from 2nd-5th graders. The club was inspired by one of my students who said to me a few weeks ago, "I wish I could just sit all afternoon and read." And I thought, "Why not?"

I sent home a flyer stating that we would serve cookies and hot chocolate to any student who wanted to come sit in the library for an hour and read.

At first I thought I would need to provide activities. Should we all read the same book? Or have discussion questions? I searched the internet for information on reading clubs and they all seemed to suggest this path. But I thought - Blah! How boring! So I decided to go with my gut and I thought, Let's Just Read For Fun!

At our first meeting of Page Turners we developed our motto:

Reading + Snacking = FUN!

That's right!
The students have 15 minutes to check out books from the library if they want, grab a snack, go to the restroom, and get cozy with a book. Then we just read. That's all. We read for 40 minutes. With 5 minutes left I invite the students to share any book that they think other club members would like. We call it - Talkin Time.

At our first meeting we had 30 students from grades 2-5 at Page Turners. Keep in mind that my whole school has fewer than 150 total students in these grades. That means we had about 20% of our students come to a club where we just sit and read. Oh yeah, and eat cookies. Yum!

The best part about this club, I get to read and eat cookies too!

~ Amanda



Update 3/11/2013 - We hit an all-time high attendance record today, the 8th meeting of Page Turners. Find out more by reading Page Turners Blows Me Away.