Karen is one of my more able middle school readers, however she is often unengaged in reading a book during the Monitored Reading (independent reading time) in our language arts period. One day in the hall before class, she asks for a conference because she has several sticky notes in her reading book that she wants to share. Her eyes sparkle under her brown curls – she is excited to talk to me today.
It was only a few days ago that she was very reticent to meet with me because she was disappointed in her book. On that day she was crestfallen as she tried to describe her book, Autumn Street by Lois Lowry (Houghton Mifflin, 1980). I didn’t let her put aside the book that day. I believed the author would appeal to her, so I told her to read the first chapter completely, then slip partway into the second chapter and see if she could make the connection. Only then would I let her switch novels if she was still disappointed. Because of this I had expected a conference request, but her enthusiasm was unexpected. Karen sits to conference with me, speaking so fast through her lisp, her words slur as she tries to gather her ideas.
Karen: You said to give the book a chance and try to get more into it. I did what you said and I am really enjoying it.
Me: OK, what changed?
Karen: Well, I really like reading books with the character’s perspective. The main character in this book is a six-year-old and I love a book where the character is telling … well, it’s from her perspective.
Me: So that is why you initially chose the book?
Karen: Yeah, ‘cause I saw the kid on the cover and I read here (the back). Now that I am into it, it’s written just like a six-year-old would talk … (Karen goes on to read an excerpt to support her opinion.)
Me: Is this one of the books you previewed during Book Bag Browsing? I notice you wrote as a goal to read the Book Bag books you put on your list. How did the Book Bag Browsing affect you?
Karen: It really helped me because when I read a book, well, I used to look at the cover, that’s it. If it had a good picture that piqued my interest, I would read it. One time I read a book, I think it was Seven Spiders Spinning, (by Gregory Maguire, HarperTrophy, 1995) and I looked at the spiders on the cover and said I will never read this book, I hate spiders. But I opened it up like you say to and I started reading. Then I really got into it and finished it over a weekend. So I thought, I really enjoyed this book even though I don’t like spiders. The fun of it (the book), it was just very interesting. So in the Book Bag Browsing I wrote down a lot of books that caught my interest. I already read all the short books that I thought would be interesting. Now I want to read a chapter book because I haven’t read a longer book in a while.
Me: How did this class or the Book Bag Browsing change what you did when you looked at a book?
Karen: It made me realize how many ways I could look at a book and find out if I was going to be able to keep reading and finish it. You know, like looking at the cover, reading the back, noticing what author it is, reading some of the pages. I really noticed that a lot of the books that I wouldn’t have chosen my normal way of choosing them, I actually went further than just looking at the cover. I found it is true, don’t judge a book by its cover.