Reading Circles Get Students to Do the Reading

In my course, the required reading is intensive and extensive. Students must read multiple texts that range across disciplines, genres, history, and culture. The goal of this interdisciplinary course is improvement of critical reading, writing, and thinking skills. My students, like many others, live complicated lives. Add to that the fact that many are not particularly good readers or people who like to read, and the result is students arriving in class not having done the reading. I decided to revisit Literature Circles, first introduced in the mid-1990s by Harvey Daniels for grades 3 through 8 in Chicago and described as small, peer-led discussion groups whose members have chosen to read the same text. Basic educators have found them enormously successful. I wondered whether they might work in my undergraduate course. Since not all the reading in my course is literature, I decided to call them Reading Circles.

To continue reading, you must be a Teaching Professor Subscriber. Please log in or sign up for full access.

Leave a Reply

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

Related Articles

I have two loves: teaching and learning. Although I love them for different reasons, I’ve been passionate about...
A team icebreaker activity for which there is no obvious solution can help scaffold student behavior in group...
Traditional slide decks for hosting content in live videoconferences have the major drawback that the content is static...
Academic integrity is one of the most critical aspects of education. Despite this, students' ability to cheat is...
In 1936, psychologist Muzafer Sherif reported a landmark study on the creation of social norms. Sherif made use...
Large language models (LLMs), such as ChatGPT and Google Bard, are in our classrooms whether we are aware...
The rolling TV cart: a beloved icon of the educational system in the 1980s and ’90s. As students,...

Are you signed up for free weekly Teaching Professor updates?

You'll get notified of the newest articles.

The Teaching Professor Conference 2024

June 7-9, 2024 • New Orleans

Connect with Fellow Educators at The Teaching Professor Conference!