Start an After-School Kids' Book Club

 

            Today's Snack: Let's make a "book" you can eat!

Cut a piece of whole-wheat bread in half. You should end up with two rectangles. These will be the front and back "covers" of your book.

Now stack up a few slices of cheese, some trimmed bologna or ham, and a lettuce leaf cut into a rectangle shape. You might even trim a zucchini length to go in there.

Now "stack" the pages of your book.

With a squeeze bottle of mustard, mayonnaise, or both, write "BOOK" on the front "cover" piece of bread.

Then eat your book!

 

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Today's Supplies:

 

Help from a parent or teacher

 

Materials to make invitations

 

A list of books you'd like to read

 

 

            It's pretty well known that kids who like to read, and read a lot, do the best in school. It's kind of like practicing for soccer or the piano: the kids who put the most time into developing the skill, and try their best, are usually the best.

 

It's the same way with reading. To be a really good reader, you need to practice. So a smart kid will look for several different ways to spend time reading. And if you can do that with your friends, and have a good time, so much the better!

 

            A great way to make sure you devote enough time to reading is to start a book club. It's fun, too!

 

 

To start a book club, you can do it on your own with a little parental help or with one or two friends. You can hold meetings at your home or someplace safe where there's adult supervision. Or you can ask a teacher, the school librarian or after-school program director to help you. But then it becomes a formal, school-sponsored activity, and you might want it to be a little more relaxed than that.

 

            Start small: commit to one book club meeting per month for three months, reading three books altogether. Then in the third month, decide if you want to continue for another three months.

 

            It's a good idea to invite the parents to at least the first meeting so that they'll know what's going on and can support (and pay for!) the club's activities.

 

            You might even consider a mother-daughter or father-son book club, or some combination, to help your parents get to know each other and your friends a little better.

 

How many students should you invite? Not too many, but not too few. Think about how many you can seat in the room or place you're going to have your club, so that everybody can see everybody else's face but you're not too squashed. Maybe six or eight, or a few more? Remember how busy some kids are with sports and scouts, and try to set a time that won't interfere with dinner or bedtime.

 

If you'd like more members, you might find a free place to meet at the library, YMCA, a church, a fitness center, or even a coffee shop, though it would be important to have adult supervision in the room or at least nearby at all times.

 

            If your school participates in a regular book catalog, you might set up your meeting when the catalog comes out so that everybody can order the same book through that service, often at a very inexpensive rate.

 

All set? To get the ball rolling, make colorful, fun invitations that tell:

 

·        the time, date and place of your first meeting

 

·        how long it's going to last (one hour?)

 

·        how often you're going to meet (once a month?)

 

·        what you're going to do (all club members will read the same book that month and come to the club meeting to briefly discuss the book and then do a related activity for a few minutes)

 

·        and advertise the fact that you're going to have refreshments (yessssss! This will bring people out to your meeting more than anything else!).

 

Mail or give to the kids you'd like to join your club. Remember, if you're not inviting the whole class, you shouldn't hand out invitations at school, but send them through the mail, so that you don't hurt kids' feelings who aren't being invited.

 

Ask participants to come to the meeting with ideas for books that the club might want to read. You might want to select three books for the next three months so that everybody has to go to the bookstore to buy a copy, or can order it online, and be ready for three months in advance.

 

Since most books are available in paperback and inexpensively as used books sold over the Internet, a book club shouldn't be too expensive for anybody. You can also sell your books to another group of kids or pass them down to your younger brothers and sisters.

 

It would be smart to check with the teachers at your grade level to see what books are going to be taught that year and the next year in class. That way, you won't be duplicating. There are so many good books out there, it would be a shame to double up on a book selected for both your club and the classroom!

 

You can make a master list of books that members recommend and then vote, so that the most popular ones are the ones selected for your club. Or each member can recommend one book, and be in charge of leading the discussion that month.

 

Here's how you could organize this:

 

1.      Invite kids to an organizational meeting and bring snacks, such as today's Treat, described at the top.

 

2.      Provide an "icebreaker" or introductory activity, such as going around the room and have everybody tell what their favorite book is so far.

 

3.      Get their contact information - phone number, mailing address, email address, and find out how they want to be reminded of upcoming meetings.

 

4.      Set the times and dates for the meetings for the first three months.

 

5.      Does everybody want to read fiction, or do some people want to mix it up with other genres, such as biography or poetry?

 

6.      Decide what the first book will be and give everybody enough time to get a copy and read it.

 

7.      Get volunteers to bring snacks related to the theme of that month's book, and remind them a few days in advance.

 

8.      Appoint a "meeting chairman" to bring in an activity each month related to that book. You can all chip in to meet expenses. Ideas:

 

• T-shirts
Decorate T-shirts with a book's characters using art motifs that fit the book's setting.

• Bookmarks
Create club bookmarks using wrapping paper or wallpaper or draw characters from books. A parent could have them laminated.

• Sleep-over
Bring a sleeping bag and watch a book-related movie.

• Field trip
Go to a book-related place or event: a play, a movie, concert, museum, zoo, historical site, botanical garden, natural area, sport event, or county fair.

• Make a donation
Collect $1 in dues each month from each member and donate a book to the library.

• Bake sale or book sale
Sell goodies or old books to raise money for the club to buy new ones.

• Acting
Act out characters, scenes, or titles of books you've read. You can even turn it into Literary Charades, in which teams try to guess what book the other team is acting out.

• Reading journals

Design and decorate a journal for each person to keep track of each book read for the club along with interesting discussion points, likes and dislikes.

 

• Collage
Use poster board, magazine clips, pieces of fabrics, other small gluable objects to create a poster-sized collage for each book you read. Display them all at the end of the year for other kids.

• Letter to the author
As a group, write a letter to the book's author. Talk about what you liked or disliked or ask any questions. Include a group photo, too. Mail it to the publishing company. Someone there will forward it on to the author. Include a copy of the letter and the photo in your club journal. Just think how exciting it would be if you hear back!