Independent Reading Changes

First, thanks to all the parents who were able to stop in for conferences.  It is always neat for me to meet the parents of the kids that I spend the day with!  I do realize that the set up isn't a perfect one as we all tend to fill up rather quickly and it doesn't always work to be able to visit with every teacher your child may have.  Any feedback about the sign-up process and/or set up of conferences (the way were organized in the LMC) would be appreciated.

At conferences I mentioned that as the reading-writing: literature course is a pilot class, there would be changes made as I evaluate what works well and what doesn't.  Well, here is one of those changes.  The Independent Reading Requirement is one assignment that occurs each quarter.  It consists of a combination of pages logged and a blog posting about a book that was completed.  The grade was worth 15% of the total grade in my class.  After evaluating the requirements I decided to make the following changes:

Blog Posting:  I have decided to put this project on hold for a quarter.  The products were not what I'd hoped for and as I looked at it, I felt I needed to make some changes to the requirements and the process for student completion of the posting.  In addition, during the Understanding Character unit, there are some pretty intensive projects so I felt it would be overload on the students to continue with the blog posting this quarter.  Look for the blog to resurface in a future quarter.

Page Logs:  I have created a new page log for the students to use.  The log is book based - meaning that students take one log for each book they are reading. When they finish a book, they turn the log in to me and take a new one for the new book they are beginning.  This way it is easier to keep track of how many books are read and  more efficient for the kids to log their pages.  Click here to view a PDF of the new log.  Students may print out a log from home if they need it.  In addition there is a new grading scale for the pages read.

Grade	Pages Read
A+	1700 pages and up
A	1600 – 1699
A-	1500 – 1599
B+	1400 – 1499
B	1300 – 1399
B-	1200 – 1299
C+	1100 – 1199
C	1000 – 1099
C-	900 – 999
D+	800 – 899
D	700 – 799
D-	600 – 699
50%	300 – 599
Zero	Less than 300

If students log minutes in silent reading during class time and just a little during an SRT at least the 300 pages should be attained. To view the handout that was shown to the students explaining the changes, click here.  If there are any questions or points that need clarification please send me an email or give me a call.

In closing, good luck to all the hunters heading out into the woods this weekend and to everyone else, Happy Thanksgiving!