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**Book Clubs, Blogs, and Threaded Discussions**
Today on my Wiki I will explore and define Book Clubs, Blogs, and Threaded discussions. These are all powerful ways to engage students and teachers in reading, writing, discussion,and problem solving that involves teamwork and collaboration.

Book Clubs

 * One of the hardest aspects of teaching literature and Literacy education is getting the right books into the hands of the right students. The era of the whole class novel is over, and if you would like to facilitate authentic student engagement with texts, a book club is the right idea for your classroom. First I will describe what the traditional book club looks like and then I will direct our use of book clubs to online book club forums. The first step to forming book clubs in your classroom is getting to know your students. What are their interests, passions, and hobbies? Take time to get to understand your role as "book whisperer". Many students like to read but do not know where to begin. Many students are not aware that there are books, magazines, articles, and graphic novels on any possible topic. If you start with the student's interests, success and engagement are much more likely. I recommend reading Noralyn Miller's The Book Whisperer, http://www.amazon.com/dp/0470372273/?tag=googhydr-20&hvadid=11706975809&ref=pd_sl_l3h6on8sl_b and a recent blog post of hers, http://blogs.edweek.org/teachers/book_whisperer/ to get a better feel for how to introduce students to the right media for them.
 * Once you have established what books are of interest to your students, let them choose books in small groups, and set up a timeline for reading. Don't break up the books into too many small sections, because it will break the reading flow, and discourage authentic engagement with the text. I recommend a few weeks, but no more than a month per book depending on the size. Each student should take reading notes, develop questions for interpretation, and at the end of the book, meet with the group that read the same book and discuss, themes, motifs, critiques, and what critical lens to apply to the text. Each group should then develop a book trailer using podcasts, I movie, or movie maker which they will present to the class.Follow the link here to a short movie on how to make book trailers: http://www.booktrailersforreaders.com/How+to+make+a+book+trailer By doing this last step, the entire class is introduced to the books read by each other group. This allows the students to make hear their peers reviews of each book and to make informed decisions based on their interests of which book and bookclub they will join next.
 * The final step to creating a well informed book club community is to have them create a virtual bookshelf like Shelfari http://www.shelfari.com/. Through a website like this students will be able to show and share what they have read. This like the web trailers will also allow students to review what other students have read, and make informed decisions on what they would like to read next. Shelfari is also a place where students can join book clubs, blog about what they have read, and be immersed in a community of readers.

Blogs

 * A weblog or blog (derived from web + log) is a web-based publication consisting primarily of periodic articles. Blogs allow for students writing to reach a global audience and to ensure authenticity in writing. The student no longer just writing for the teacher, but for evaluation from their peers in their own classroom and school, to students in surrounding districts and abroad. A great free resource for creating and maintaining a blog is at http://wordpress.com/. The important aspect of a blog is to write with an audience in mind. Students should read and comment on other students blogs, should do research, follow, and comment on the blogs of professionals in a particular field of their choice. Use this step by step guide to customize your Wordpress blog: http://codex.wordpress.org/New_To_WordPress_-_Where_to_Start Blogging gets students writing on topics that interest them and allows them to develop an unique writing voice.

Threaded Discussions

 * Threaded discussions are conversations in which software aids the user by visually grouping messages. The discussions are organized by topic, not just chronology, so students can comment or join discussions based on the topic of their interest. This is like cloud computing in the sense that students all collaboratively work on a shared resource, or in this case a discussion. I have used Google docs for my work and academic purposes and find it very user friendly for group collaboration and threaded discussions. Follow this link to get started http://www.google.com/google-d-s/b1.html with Google Docs. Another resource for teachers and administrators is Blackboard. This website allows for teachers and students to create threads, from which all other students in the class can comment and discuss based on thread topic. Check out the link for blackboard here: http://www.blackboard.com/.