Book Love

Having just received this book in the mail a day ago, I am not yet a third of the way through. However, I can already say that it is one of the most important books I will read in preparation for teaching. Kittle is writing "Book Love" to help teachers address and inspire those students who have fallen out of love or interest with reading for academic purposes and for enjoyment. The process of gradual disengagement and failure to provide reading instruction past a certain age that she describes is uncanny to my own experience in high school and even college. I am ashamed to report that I do not have a love for reading nor do I read voraciously for enjoyment. This is something I have wanted to reconcile in myself for a long time, especially now that I will need to model positive reading habits and practices for my future students. Therefore, this is also a "self-help" book for me. From what I have read in the first couple chapters, I expect Kittle's book to give me useful, applicable strategies for becoming a stronger, more passionate reader, and then extend that passion and endurance to my future students. Thus far, I am a little surprised and intrigued by Kittle's unapologetic statements about what the Common Core requires of our students vs. what they actually need to become life-long readers, and how we teachers have a responsibility to achieve the latter goal above all else.

In reading the first part of Book Love, I feel a sense of familiarity within my own life. I admit that as an adult, I do not read for pleasure enough. I often feel a lot of the struggles that the students in this book feel. When looking back on my life, there was a time where I loved to read for pleasure. I could not get enough of a certain author as an early teen. I would like to say that my life is simply too busy right now to read anything that is not academic, but I know that is not the whole truth. Somewhere along the way, I realized that my ability to read was not strong. My fluency and stamina is not where I think it should be or where I would like it to be. It takes me a long time to get through a text and sometimes I do not even remember what I have read. I found myself doing the minimum many times to get through classes in high school and I am sad to feel as though I really have no positive memories of reading and literature in high school. My memories are mostly of the confusion I felt. In chapter 1, Kittle describes some of the reasoning for why students fall behind and stay behind in reading. It was hard to read the words, “When our curriculum is consistently too difficult for the readers we have, we’ll send them on to our colleagues at the next grade level in a worse place than we received them.” (Kittle: pg 5) That statement felt like a punch in the face, because we know it is true but it often continues to happen. We promise ourselves that the following school year we will be better teachers, and we will work harder. I like how Kittle feels no shame in calling out poor teaching practices that all teachers may have been guilty of at one time or another. Pleasure reading is the key to academic reading and success. I like the style in which Kittle writes as well, it is informative, but it is also narrative and that makes it feel more personal and less of a text book. I like Kittle’s ideas on how to better understand student readers and how to use books they will actually love to monitor their reading strategies. In chapter 3, Kittle has the students set goals for them to increase their fluency and stamina. Overall, I found the first part of this book to be very helpful to read for me as a teacher and me as a reader. There are some very bad habits that I need to break as a reader in order to assist students in becoming better, more engaged readers.

Katelyn, 

I also saw this as a "self-help" book for me.  According to Kittle, you just need to get the right book in your hands.  I really liked her idea about Book Talks.  As a class we just did this in Social Studies.  I really liked hearing from others a little bit about the books they had chosen for their Literacy Connections project.  Just by spending a few minutes talking about books, you can find an interest in several books. In order to be model for students we need to be showing them our love of books.  I really liked an idea of displaying what your reading to the students somewhere in your classroom.  

Sandy,
Your son has it exactly right. He would quit reading if the reading level was too high or was an uninteresting topic. Kittle described a boy who could not get pass the first 100 pages of any book.  The reason was because he was not interested in the contents of the book.  Once he found a book about a baseball player and his struggles, he read the book until the end because he wanted to know what happened to the baseball player.  This boy probably loved sports or was similar to him in some way.  I think your son is absolutely correct in saying that he would have strong, negative emotions towards the book as well.  I can recall a few books that I would never pick up again as well.  I think learning the levels of readers will be important.

My main takeaway is that Kittle’s concept and embodiment of “book love” should be the core of my classroom… and that book love begins with ME, the teacher. For Kittle, reading is not only a lesson in love, but also a love to end all loves! The main characters in her love story are numerous and extend to everyone in her life… students, family, associates, and even strangers. Kittle is unapologetically passionate about reading, and this for me (as a soon-to-be teacher) is enviable. If the teacher is not passionate about reading and literacy, how can we expect our students to find and possess that love?

I find it humorous that Kittle is constantly asking those around her, including her students, what they are reading. She asks and challenges them often about their selections, responses, and successes (as well as failures). In the classroom, the love of reading can be very quiet and personal (e.g. silent reading for pleasure) as well as lively and interactive through book clubs and whole group discussion.

Another takeaway is the importance of taking surveys and identifying student interests early in the year. When students are well matched with a book, they can set goals, build stamina, and increase complexity more easily. Kittle reveals that “students are greedy readers when the book is just right” (p. 40). When students create book lists they can easily read, complete, and move on to the next selection without hesitation. As for those students who need to abandon a book, moving on can be swift and painless.

My 11-year old son, Donnie, was a fan of The Magic Treehouse series. When he finished one of the books, he quickly located another title that was available in his school’s library, so he was always reading. He easily progressed through dozens of titles in the following series that increased in complexity: The Magic Treehouse, Harry Potter, 39 Clues, Chasing Vermeer, Hatchet, Kingdom Keepers, and The Throne of Glass.

Another important takeaway is that both teacher and non-reader have to have patience. Kittle shares a story about Keith, the charming, likeable high school football player who neither reads nor likes reading. He considers himself a poor writer as well. Kittle acknowledges that teachers must take slow baby steps with these students… and never give up.

Kittle shares a quote from children’s author Dav Pilkey who states that “as adults, I think we sometimes forget how hard it is to learn to read. It’s really, REALLY hard. If we add negative associations to something that is already difficult and often frustrating, we might just turn kids off of reading altogether, despite our best intentions” (p. 5).

A non-reader is similar to an inactive person when facing the challenge of reading and finding book love. Kittle reminds both students and teachers to “remember the challenge of building stamina from nothing” and adds that “even if the book is right, reading it is like that first run after years of inactivity” (p. 39). Keith eventually found a book that matched his level and interests, and he was hooked! Along the way he started, lost interest and abandoned books, but he continued to move to the next selection and always kept reading.

To keep my students moving forward and on track, I can incorporate conferences with my students, which provides the opportunity for both formal and informal assessment. Kittle affirms that “to understand when and how to use language that empowers discouraged readers, you have to learn to listen well” (p. 78). Through conferencing, my students will have the opportunity to share successes and roadblocks, and with hope, build a trusting relationship with me. I can ask questions, listen, and provide encouragement.

The final takeaway is that reading makes students better writers. Kittles reveals that “writing is discovery” and that “when we write, we uncover what we didn’t know we knew” (p. 99). Through reading, students view grammar, punctuation, vocabulary, spelling, and tone… among numerous other elements. I love the use of writing journals and storyboarding to organize and facilitate the process, as well as reflect and make connections.

I began at the introduction’s beginning… and now I end at the conclusion of the book. Kittle leaves us, future teachers and graduates of Northern Illinois University, with the following message:

We can change the story of reading.
We have to.
Every child. Every year. Every classroom.
Book love—pass it on.

Penny Kittle’s Book Love reads like a genuine, personal love letter to reading, inspiring students to read, and writing while also providing practical ideas and experience based tactics about how to translate this love into ELA classroom instruction. I found that much of what she writes in this book is a living model for how a strong independent reading life informs one’s writing, which was one of the more significant take-aways that stuck with me. Kittle expresses multiple times, in many ways that she is not concerned with the assessment driven mediocrity that pervades the education system; she is more interested in students reading to learn and learning to love reading through any means possible. This means that our main, underlying goal should always be to create lifelong readers who have the habits and stamina to always choose to read (for enjoyment, at the very least) and have the intrinsic motivation to seek new materials when they are in need.
As previously mentioned, Kittle not only indulges in exploring her teaching philosophy through theory and inspiration, but also included the nitty-gritty information about what this looks like in an actual classroom. From reaching unengaged readers, to building a classroom library, to establishing instructional balance, to conferencing with students about reading, to assessing readership through well-crafted response prompts, to building writing and reading communities in the classroom, to providing quality book talks, Kittle does offer many applicable ideas to actually making thing happen for teachers and students.
The one thing I questioned while reading this book was how I could use all this excellent inspiration and information in my career as an elementary school teacher. Kittle draws mostly on her experience as an English teacher of high school seniors. After reading her book I will admit that I am more intrigued by the potential of teaching middle school because it would be possible to use more of her ideas, but what If I never teach middle school? How can I instill that sustained passion for reading in elementary school kids? What kind of texts do I recommend? How can I expect them to establish a strong independent reading life at age nine, ten, or even younger? Is it possible?