GET THEM TALKING!

USING STUDENT-LED BOOK TALKS

IN THE PRIMARY GRADES

THE READING TEACHER

ARTICLE BY: ALIDA K. HUDSON
Shakia Mosley

Professor Puryear

TLED 432

January 24, 2023

Article Presentation
 WHY BOOK TALKS?
• Book talks are not a book report, nor given to prove to the
teacher that the student has read a book
• It’s an opportunity for the reader to share with other
readers a book that they enjoyed
• Book talks are brief, enthusiastic oral descriptions of a
book that a student has read, and book talks are given with
the intention of enticing others to read (Atwell, 2007)
• Students should familiarize the audience (other readers)
about the book in one to two minutes
• Research has shown that students become more interested
and eager to read a book after listing to a book talk
• Book Talks not only increase students’ motivation to read
but helps build a community of readers
• A way to introduce students to a vast array of texts because
it can expose them to many different authors, genres, and
series within a matter of minutes
• The conversion that will
• Beginner readers can benefit from discussions that center on
comprehension
• Book Talks will teach students early on how to make
meaning of a text in order to share it with their peers
 STEPS TO IMPLEMENTING STUDENT-
LED BOOK TALKS

Step 1: Model, Model, Model

• Show the students a video on what a book talk looks
like
• Have the students talk about what they noticed about
book talks from the video to a peer
• Show them how they identified the title, and author,
and discussed the main character of the story Step 2: Direct Instruction
• Talk to them about how the book talk is a way to• try
First, read a picture book aloud and then prepare the book
and get others to read the book as well talk and what information should be talked about
• As they discussed, the teacher created an anchor chart for
reference
• Using the anchor chart model a book talk on the book that
was just read
• The teacher modeled book talks for several days using
books that students have previously heard like The Very
Hungry Caterpillar by Eric Carle (1987)
STEPS TO IMPLEMENTING STUDENTS-
LED BOOK TALKS CONT.

Step 3: Practice Makes Perfect Step 4: Present

• Provide students will a familiar fairy tale because • Each student will sit at the front of the classroom and hold the
they have a lot of background knowledge of book that they will be discussing and their book talk paper
classic stories • When they have finished speaking, celebrated the student and
• Each student has a section of the book talk for then allow other peers to ask questions
their group and this is a way to help them gain an • Question and answer time develops students' oral language
understanding of a book talk and provide support
• You can choose a day like every Friday is ”Book Talk Friday”
• Each day the students can prepare and present a and when they present you want to make sure students with
different part of the book talk different genres are presenting on one day
Holding students accountable for only a part, in
the beginning, provides a scaffold for them to
become comfortable
• Then students will become responsible for
developing their own complete book talk and the
teacher can work with them in small groups to get
them ready to present to their peers
 STEPS TO IMPLEMENTING STUDENTS-
LED BOOK TALKS CONT.

•Step 5: Model, Model, Model and Accommodate as Needed

• Continue to do book talk throughout the year and reference the anchor chart
• For students who reluctant to speak, they can be paired with another student
and give a book talk on a book they both read. They can also be given sentence
stems and many opportunities to practice
• For a special education student they can verbally tell the book while the teacher
can transcribe
• Another accommodation is video recorded book talk for other classes and
challenging students to develop a book talk from a point of view of one of the
character in the story
 PAUSE AND
PONDER

• What opportunities would

your students have for
developing their speaking
and listening skills?
• How could you broaden
your student's knowledge of
various authors and genres?
• How would you have your
students discuss and share
book with one another?
 SUMMARY

Book discussions are not restricted to a particular reader or text type. Student-led book
discussions help students understand the text and foster a reading community by allowing
them to get to know one another as readers. Book discussions help students get ready for the
future whether they are used as a standalone activity or as a component of the readers'
workshop structure. By teaching students to use language to describe and explain books they
have read, express their opinions to others, and ask and answer questions, they help to foster
a lively reading community, improve students' comprehension, and advance spoken language
development. An real activity that can be easily implemented into any classroom teaching
first grade is student-led book talks.
 REFERENCES

• livs14. (2019, May 1). How to do book talks in the elementary classroom. The Colorful Apple.
Retrieved January 26, 2023, from https://thecolorfulapple.com/2019/03/book-talks-in-the-
classroom/
• Hudson, Alida K. "Get Them Talking! Using Student-Led Book Talks in the Primary Grades." The
Reading Teacher 70.2 (2016): 221-25. Web.