Literature Circles

1. Literature Circles an introduction…

2. What are Literature Circles? • a collaborative way of approaching reading and learning about what you are reading • useful for any reading groups, study groups or book clubs, a way that involves everyone! • literature circles “rotate” (in circles ), with each person trying each of the roles • Literature circles help readers engage meaningfully with the texts they are reading! • Literature circles can be used with any writing sample, from paragraph to news article to chapter to books (fiction or nonfiction) -- with any written text! learn more

3. Literature Circle roles The easiest way to begin to understand the power of literature circles is to learn and understand the various roles • Discussion Director • Creative Connector • Story Mapper or Illustrator • Summarizer • Vocabulary Finder

4. Discussion Director • Facilitates discussions when group meets; is responsible for: - Making sure everyone has a turn - Gently reminds that it’s someone else’s turn when anyone talks tooooo long  - Guides the conversation from one person to another asneeded - Might “recap” and repeat outline of what’s been said • Creates and asks 3 “fat” questions that will get the group to dig into the book and share their thoughts and opinions.

5. Creative Connector • Selects three to five connections with the text while reading that reminds them of something/someone else and briefly shares the phrase/passage and the connection. • Example # 1: You are reading about a mother and daughter relationship and a particular line spoken by the mother reminds you of a conversation/situation you experienced with your mother – share your story and talk about your feelings and how you imagine the character feels at that point of the story. • Example # 2: The story mentions a particular place and it’s a place you’ve visited before, talk about that – try to connect specifics in the reading to your real experience.

6. Vocabulary Vitalizer • Selects two to three unknown or important words from the reading assignment • Researches their meaning • Provides the list and definitions/explanations to the group (may provide photos or drawings, too) • Make sure the rest of the group records the words and their meanings in their book as well.

7. Story Mapper or Illustrator • Chooses a story map, graphic organizer, or illustration to explain part of the story. For Example: -Bubble Map (character traits) -Tree Map (story elements) -Flow Map (events) -Double Bubble or Venn Diagram (compare & contrast) -Illustrate a scene from the selection • Explain and share your map or illustration to the team. **Note! The drawing talents of the idea illustrator are not so important – it’s the connections made that are important (however, if you are one of those lucky people with a talent for drawing, here is an opportunity for you to shine! )

8. Summarizer • Writes a summary of the section you read. *Be sure to include only the important characters and events. Don’t try to tell everything that happened! • Reads the summary to the team.

9. Sound like fun? Here's how it starts: 1. The discussion director will lead the discussion about how far the group will be able to read before the first group meeting. Meetings > Tuesdays and Thursdays Reading and Assignments > all other days 2. Jobs will be handed out. (After that, they rotate in a circle) 3. Students will read and do their jobs.

10. At the first "real" literature circle meeting: • Welcome everyone! • Q & A (help each other!) • Discussion Director takes the lead and selects someone (or asks for volunteers) to start – then makes sure each person has a turn! • The discussion director might determine how many minutes each person has for the first round of reporting and announce that each person should try to keep their presentation to ___ minutes. • The discussion director might determine (or ask the group for their opinion – OR the teacher might stipulate) whether or not questions should be held until the presenter is done, or whether questions should come “popcorn” style (as they “pop”/as they occur to you) continued…

11. First meeting, continued… • So the ‘circle’ of role reporters checks in – and time is allowed for follow-up questions and comments after (or during) each report • Hopefully, group dynamics will be strong and the results will be amazing! • Mrs. Bochert will monitor and “guide on the side” as little as possible, allowing each group to grow and find their strengths – and to enjoy their enriched understandings of the readings • Any participant may also add information to the other roles reports– as time and discussion director direction allows