This Fall, Houghton Lake Junior High School students in Mr. Judd’s 8th-grade ELA classes participated in a collaboration with pre-service student teachers at Central Michigan University to form Reading Clubs. In coordination with Dr. Amy Ford’s ENG 211 classes, 8th-grade students were encouraged to choose a book of their liking, while the college students followed suit. As the different groups worked through their individual titles at their own pace and in their own elements, they would come together to share thoughts and ideas in their shared Padlet – an online resource that acts as an interactive discussion board.
Students at each level were prompted with the same lines of questioning, and often had overlapping titles they were reading. With the shared space and streamlined questioning, the two groups were able to prioritize connecting with the text, its characters, and, more importantly, with one another. As the days went by and progress was made in texts, questions started to populate the Padlet:
As the foundation had been set, students themselves then began to populate the board itself – first with the book they chose and why they chose it:
After title selection and posting their whys, students were given time to read and encouraged to take their titles home as they engaged in weekly collaboration through the shared Padlet. As time went on, the Padlet continued turning it into a living, breathing space to do nothing more than talk about books and celebrate their stories:
The last few weeks have been filled with books, ideas, conversations, and beyond, all sparked by this collaboration with CMU students. Reading Clubs will come to an end with the close of Central Michigan’s Fall Semester, but the ideas, discussions, and experience this project allowed our students here at Houghton Lake to engage with will forever live on in their minds and further solidified each of their love for story and storytelling. So, thank you to Dr. Ford, her amazing students, and, of course, my fantastic bunch of 8th graders for going on this reading adventure together with us!
Mr. Judd
Houghton Lake Jr. Sr. High School