Book Review: Igniting a Passion for Reading

Igniting a Passion for Reading: Successful Strategies for Building Lifetime Readers

Steven L. Layne

Scholastic, 2009

Source: purchased

Rating: 5 out of 5 stars

Steven L. Layne’s passion for teaching reading jumps from the page and into your lap.  You have to decide what to do with it from there.  In Igniting a Passion for Reading, Layne lays out specific strategies, activities and procedures he believes have helped make his students into lifetime readers.  What he suggests--no, insists upon--should not be surprising if you’ve been teaching reading for any small amount of time.  Unfortunately, with schools hyper focused on test scores and STEM initiatives, reading for the sake of reading has been pushed to the side.  The focus in this book is not teaching skill, but teaching will.

As a middle school teacher, I have parents start out the year by telling (with their child right there) that “Johnny” or “Mandy”  isn’t a reader, so good luck. Usually these are my kids who struggle. It’s not because they can’t read, but because they don’t want to and why should they if they can still get by with good grades? I’ve been looking for ways to pull them in--convince them it’s worth it.  Steven Layne has given me ways--so many ways!

My one major problem with this is that I want to do everything he suggests. In a forty-eight minute period I’m already strapped for time. I’m going to try and incorporate the read aloud two times a week and the Buzz About Books once a week, and try to get in a book chat now and then, but Can I fit it in?  Truly fit it in?  We’ll see.  The best part about this is that Layne not only gives you step by step instruction on how you can implement these strategies, but examples and masters to use in your classroom.  It’s also really easy to read, meaning it’s a great summer professional development read! I read a chapter here, and a chapter there over the first two weeks of break, taking notes as I went along and was still able to read my fiction books as well.    

I definitely recommend Igniting a Passion for Reading by Steven L. Layne to anyone who teaches--whether you’re a reading teacher or a social studies teacher.  If you are a teacher of reading or literature, there are so many great ideas you can incorporate into your classroom--some of them don’t even take up classroom time!  Igniting a Passion for Reading is my new go to recommendation for new teachers!

If you like this book, then make sure you also check out The Book Whisperer by Donalyn Miller. She has a second book out as well, but I haven't had a chance to read it yet.

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Moving Words--A bit of earth

Ahhh, The Secret Garden.  I remember reading this growing up.  I always disliked Mary--even later on in the book.  She never settled with me.  I did feel sorry for her, losing her parents and having to live in this horrible place, but I still couldn't get past how bratty she was in the beginning.

However, I like this quote.  I like this reminder that all you need is a bit of earth to start something new.  Just give someone a bit of space and what will they do with it?  I think of my students when I read this quote. How can I give them just a little bit of earth?  I don't want to give them the flower, already grown and beautiful.  Instead, they need the space, the permission, the support to do what they can and what they want with their bit of earth.

I've decided this spring to start a little gardening, even though I know little about it.  Just a little bit of earth is all I need.  What will I achieve?

What do you think of when you read this quote?

Teach Like Your Hair's On Fire by Rafe Esquith (Not YA)

Okay, so I admit that this is not Young Adult Literature. In fact, it's not fiction.  This is one of my nonfiction selections for the summer.  Specifically, it's about teaching--surprise!

If you're a student of mine, or a teenager, you may want to skip this one, but feel free to read if you'd like.

If you're a fellow teacher, you may enjoy the review below.


http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=6939776

Teach Like Your Hair's On Fire reads more like a memoir than it does a book on teaching.  Rafe Esquith details how he runs his classroom and what areas he focuses on (all of them it seems).  He discusses building character with his students, creating a film club, a problem solving club, book clubs, a theater troupe, and all sorts of different activities for his students.  I'm amazed by Mr. Esquith's dedication and also the dedication of his students, with his optional classroom hours before and after school each day, plus time on Saturdays, past students staying after to be involved in different activities, and the trips he takes with his traveling theater troupe. He truly has some amazing ideas and techniques, but I will be honest: most of it seems impossible to me, a new mother, who already feels the lack of time with my daughter eating away at me.   In fact, his extreme dedication has actually made me feel guilty for not also doing these things, and I know that I already do quite a lot.  So teacher friends, although I did enjoy some chapters quite a lot and found them helpful (chapter two details his central behavior plan using the six levels of moral development and is just fascinating to read), be prepared to feel inadequate after reading this--unless you too are able to devote hours before and after school, on the weekends, every day and have the most wonderfully behaved students ever--all of them, all of the time.  I, for one, have quite a lot of growing to do in order to become such a phenomenal educator.

Stay tuned for To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee.  I am revisiting this book after quite a few years.