Great Website for Encouraging Boys to Read

BoysRead.org is great website to help teachers, librarians, and parents in the quest to help boys connect with books. However, as a teacher I will introduce my students to this website as it's designed for boys to use. I found the site using Google.

BoysRead.org has a plethora of useful information. You can find Learning Initiatives and links for teachers and librarians. They also have a section titled TRIBES which is a guide to leading informal reading circles. Books We Love is another section. Here you can find lists of great books for boys with links to author websites. Not only does this site focus on reading but also on writing and editing among other things.

Introduce your boys to this website. I bet they'll love it too!

www.boysread.org/index.html

Boys and Their Books

I found this image on Flickr, and I chose it because I love that it emphasizes the importance of booktalks. Booktalking is a great way to interest boys (and everyone else) in books.

Like a great movie trailer, a booktalk can be very captivating. When doing booktalks, you want to say just enough about the book to pique the interest of your audience. Don't give away too much information or there will be no point in reading the book. If you have not read the book before, be honest and don't pretend you have. The more fun and enticing you make your booktalks, the more the kids will want to read.

For advice on giving booktalks, check out the following website.

www.uri.edu/artsci/lsc/Faculty/geaton/MSLMAtalk/



image source information: http://www.flickr.com/photos/nypl/3109294361/

Searching Databases

My assignment this week is to search 4 databases using 4 different techniques. I searched for information in working with reluctant readers, particularly boys.

Building Block Method

Project MUSE

s1 - boy*

s2 - book*

s1+s2 = 24,447

s3 - reluctant WITH read*

s1+s2+s3 = 2191

s4 - YA

s1+s2+s3+s4 = 97

As you can see, the use of limiters helped immensely in narrowing down my search to a manageable number of hits.

From these hits, I would choose Judging a Book by Its Cover: Publishing Trends in Young Adult Literature.

Citation Pearl

JStor

For this search, I used the advance search option and search for boys and reluctant.

boys AND reluctant = 11,597

As this is too many hits, I added the term reader. I used the proximity operator NEAR as well.

boys AND reluctant NEAR5 reader = 102 results

Of these hits, I would choose to read the 9th hit Rescuing Reluctant Readers by Chris Crowe.

Specific Facet First

LexisNexis

For this search, I typed in the question, "How do you connect boys and books?" and received 994 hits.

I narrowed my search by using boys AND reluctant WITH readers. This yielded 507 hits. Still too many; so I tried to be even more specific.

As my goal is to be a middle school librarian and I am now a 7th grade teacher, I decided to use:

middle AND school AND boys And reluctant With readers - this resulted in 28 hits.

Of these hits, I was most interested in Must Reads Blend Fright, Fun from the Washington Post.

Browsing Search

LibLit

For my last search, I decided upon the browsing technique. I used boys AND books in my search and received 113 hits. This is not a relatively high number, but I wanted to narrow my search even more.

To that end, I limited my search to within the last 12 months. With these new parameters, I received 12 records.

Of these 12, my favorite was the very first one: Book Groups the Way Boys Like Em' by Michael Sullivan.

The Compound by S. A. Bodeen | LibraryThing

The following is the tag cloud for "The Compound" by S.A. Bodeen. I love this book for both boys and girls, but I think boys will be especially drawn to it due to the subject matter. As the tags suggest, it's a book about nuclear fallout, death, and deception. What more could a boy want? When you read "The Compound", I hope you enjoy it as much as I did.
www.librarything.com/work/4723765/47698590

The Compound by S. A. Bodeen LibraryThing: "(9) !Finished 08(1) !jy(1) !Winter 08(1) $6.99 (4 copies)(1) *l(1) 15 year old boy(1) 912(1) 2008(3) 2008 top 10 read of the year(1) 2009(2) 2009 MS Summer Reading(1) 7/8th(1) a good time(1) AAudio 09(1) Action/Adventure/Suspense(1) adult fiction(1) Advance reading copy(1) Ages 12 - 16(1) Ages 12 – 16(1) ala2008(1) anokaberry 2009(1) apocalypse(1) apocalyptic(3) AR Quiz No. 122908 EN Fiction(1) arc(1) armageddon(1) atomic war(1) audio(1) Audiobook(1) awesome(1) betrayal(1) billionaires(1) bomb shelter(3) bomb shelters(1) bombshelter(1) box_twelve(1) boy characers(1) boys(2) boys read(1) boys suspense(1) bratty(1) brothers(2) cannibalism(2) carnegie library of pittsburgh(1) Child Called It List(1) cloning(1) comments(1) committee(1) compound(2) contemporary(1) control(1) controlling fathers(1) creepy(1) dark(1) Debby to Read(1) deception(11) disaster(1) Donation West 2009(2) dysfunctional family(4) dystopia(3) eld(1) end of the world(1) family(17) family life(1) Family Relationships(4) family safe survival(1) father-son relationships(2) fathers(8) fear(2) fiction(13) For Book Club(1) for:thumbsup(1) from:library(1) future(1) goodreads(1) guys read(1) hardcover(1) high school(2) hoaxes(4) home(1) I.Kanreed(1) insanity(5) internet(1) isikkent list(1) James' Books - To Read(1) juvenile(1) Kearsten(1) Leila(1) library book(1) lies(1) Listened(1) lone star(1) Lone Star 2009-2010(1) Lone Star List(1) Lone Star List 2009-2010(1) male(1) male poi"

RSS Feed

I chose to add the feed from Graphic Novel News (at bottom of blog) as I see graphic novels as a way to bridge the gap for reluctant readers. I believe graphic novels appeal to boys in part because they seem to be less intimidating.

Graphic novels are a new concept to many parents and teachers, therefore, making it hard to make recommendations. My hope is the better educated adults become with these novels the better our ability to relate to our reluctant readers.

Adults are quick to make assumptions about "comic books" when, in actuality, many graphic novels are high-quality and worthy of our attention. For more information on the use of graphic novels, please see The Graphic Classroom blog.
www.graphicclassroom.blogspot.com

Books for Boys Podcast

I was surprised to find there are relatively few podcasts related to reluctant male readers. I was pleased, though, to find an interview with Greg Neri on Tampa Bays Media Talk on YouTube.

Mr. Neri writes graphic novels. His latest novella, Chess Rumble, deals with the issues facing urban teenage boys. As well as having amazing art work, the format of the book is set up as a chess match with an opening move, middle game, and end game which I believe adds to the appeal.

In the podcast, Greg Neri discusses the importance of presenting information in non-traditional ways in order to engage boys. He states that this is an exciting time right now because media and technology are changing the way we present information to include how author's write books.
To view the podcast, click on the link below.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=brZRVDlznLo



For a look at the book, check out this trailer on YouTube.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=qHPpsU7aYHQ

Related Blog

For a blog related to my topic, I searched Google for "boys and books" and found "Boys Blogging Books". I'm so excited that I found this site as it previews different books with reviews written by teenage boys.

This excerpt from a post shows boys will easily relate to this blog..." Parts of "The Cry of the Icemark" were catchy, and I enjoyed reading those parts, because there were action-filled battle scenes and heroics. You would like these parts of the book if you’re into books about King Arthur,” “Lord of the Rings,” and the “Inheritance” series by Christopher Paolini. The only bad thing about this book was that it dragged at some times, and it seemed as if there were a few too many chapters about Thirrin finding good allies. I would have liked the climax battle scenes to be longer."

They also have video reviews and guest reviewers. The purpose of the blog is "to promote Boys Reading Books" which is perfect for my topic of study.

You can find Boys Blogging Books at www.boysbloggingbooks.blogspot.com