Ins and Outs of Literature Circles

Daniels determines the effectiveness of literature circle strategies by asking: "Is this something real readers do?"

It is an important question to ask.  A friend and I were talking a bit ago about reading, and she told me that she does not like to read in school because teachers ruin the text with all of the assignments that they require.  This is something that I have heard often from friends and classmates.  I believe we are all in agreement that busy work that requires students to tear a text apart is not the way to structure an English classroom.  Instead, we have agreed that students need to engage in more real-life discussions and thought-encouraging activities.

Literature circles are very attractive, particularly the record of successful examples that Daniels includes in Literature Circles: Voice and Choice in Book Clubs & Reading Groups.  However, despite the detailed examples and ideas that Daniels puts forth, I still feel very unsure of how I could implement literature circles in my classroom.

I love the idea of student-led discussions.  I believe that in order to engage students in reading, the students must make independent choices on what to read and what to discuss.  But, what is the right balance of student-directed and teacher-directed reading?

I really do not like role sheets.  They are very confining, even when they are made to be open-ended.  Students may feel stuck in their role.  For example, someone who is the "Passage Finder" may feel like they are unable to share a connection or an interesting discussion question that they find in the text.  Students should be free to discuss whatever they come across in the text - whatever reactions or feelings or thoughts.  For high school students especially, role sheets seem limiting and even a bit demeaning.

However, there needs to be some scaffolding, especially in the introduction of literature circles in the classroom.  Modeling seemed like a good alternative to role sheets.  I like the idea of having teachers demonstrating what "real" readers do as they interact with a text.  I also was impressed with Forst's idea of including other teachers and faculty in literature circles.  They could also help to guide (not lead) the students to an understanding of how to meaningfully discuss the text before them.  Reading logs and response journals are more strategies that I prefer.  Students can free-write in reading logs about how they react to the text, and then use those tangible responses to lay a foundation for literature circle discussions.  Response journals (where the student writes a response to the text and the teacher responds in a way that further challenges the student's reponse) is another way for teachers to further the discussion in literature circles without limiting students to a role.

I understand that the roles (connector, questioner, passage master, and illustrator) are important, but instead of breaking them down into four or five separate roles maybe instead they could be introduced and reviewed in a mini-lesson as ways to approach a text.  Then, as students are reading, they could refer back to these four roles (or, "reading strategies") as they read in order to create discussion (if they feel the need).

While reading The Book Thief, I began to think about ways to incorporate it into literature circles.  I combined those thoughts with ideas of teaching a thematic English class.  In eighth grade, we read Diary of Anne Frank coupled with a unit on the Holocaust.  So, if I were to teach a unit on the Holocaust, it would be awesome to structure the unit around literature circles.  Students could select a novel to read, ranging from The Book Thief, Night, Maus, Diary of Anne Frank, and A Woman in Berlin, and could then participate in literature circles based on their chosen novels.  The unit could conclude with students presenting on the novel that they read followed by class discussions on the various interactions of different people and characters with the events of the Holocaust.  Instead of just reading one novel on the Holocaust, students would be exposed to a variety of texts, and may be encouraged to read books that other groups had read.  This activity could be expanded to a theme that we will explore in class later: adolescents in conflict.  The Book Thief could be included in a literature circles exploration of a canon of literature written by or about adolescents exposed to different wars, ranging from civil wars to the World Wars to even something like the Hatfield-McCoy families feud.