“I haven’t read a whole book since 6th grade.”
“I just used the internet during Covid and didn’t read my books in middle school.”
“I hate reading.”
“Do we have to read?”
Those are the comments I received a few weeks ago when I told my kids they would be reading a book from my classroom library every single Friday until the end of the school year. Doesn’t it just make you sad??? I felt sad for them that they hadn’t connected with characters on a deeper level. I felt sad that they hadn’t felt the feeling of not wanting to put down a book that was so good but they had to because class had ended. Possibly, they hadn’t experienced the feeling of their teacher reading aloud to them and stopping before the bell when they just wanted ONE. MORE. CHAPTER.
The reality is that as millennials make goals to read 12 books in 2023 with the aesthetically pleasing social media story template, Gen Z is googling the plot line of their books so they can simply pass the test and move on. And it just breaks my heart. I am sure you are thinking about how I am wrong and how you have a classroom full of readers and you see kids in the library all the time…but think about the number of kids who are actively reading compared to those who are not. I was chatting with Profe. Zulita over the weekend and she shared that she had a moment where she had to look at her kids and tell them she knew they were fake reading. It made me take a moment to think about who was probably fake reading in my class….and in their ELA classes….and every other class that dares to make them consume words and information with their eyes. People, we have to break this culture of anti-reading and it starts before they even open the book.
If there is one piece of advice I can give you before having your world language learners read in the second language, it is to give them something BEFORE they read that will prepare them for the actual text. Students oftentimes have comprehension issues in their first language that will then translate to their second language. Our job is to provide CI-rich input…but even our most comprehensible text can be challenging for learners who struggle to read in their first language. If a student is disengaged before they even pick up the book, let’s stop to consider some ways that we can make a book more accessible to everyone and get some buy-in to not just “fake read”. Here are five pre-reading strategies for world language classes that you can use to get your learners excited (hopefully) about reading!
This can look different for everyone and any text. For a novel, you may need to front-load chapter by chapter / groups of chapters depending on how many unique words there are. Front loading vocab can look like:
Up until this week, I have always referred to common words in English and Spanish as cognates. I just saw them referred to as transparent words, words that you can see right through! I’m not sure if it was the author’s or publisher’s idea to call them that. I found it in the book Arroz con cosas. I really liked this take. Looking for these common words is so crucial to their proficiency and reading fluency. I like to do a pre-reading annotation where they highlight words they know and underline words they need to look up. We look up those words in groups on wordreference.com and create a glossary with words or images.
Making predictions about a text can be really fun. I like to have my students do this right after I front-load vocab. I will give them a chunk of words with little to no context or show images from the book if there are any. Students have to guess the plot based on the words or images they saw. We use a prediction tracker sheet to record the information or we simply share out and I write their predictions on the board or chart paper. You can grab my prediction tracker here!
I know…sounds a little strange, right? If you have done my book tasting activity, you know that students are looking at the book cover, both front and back to make a judgment on the book. I think a book’s appearance is one of the most important things kids consider when choosing something to read. I will be the first to say that I prefer to read books with visually appealing book covers over boring/plain covers….so I can only assume the kids have similar feelings. World language readers usually have really amazing covers. I just purchased Arroz con cosas and the front cover really says a lot about what happens in the book. It can also lead to kids making incredible predictions about what they are going to read. If you are reading a short story, find some Google images or icons from Flaticon to show to learners to get their minds churning about the plot. Ultimately, we hope that this intrigues kids, but we can learn a lot from this even if they don’t! If you are looking to source books that entice your kids and you have the budget to do so, I hope you would be considering their opinion on topics, themes, and things they want to read about.
I recently taught the book La Pinata de Renata and I was really impressed with the amount of embedded culture in each chapter. Something that I plan to do with the remaining chapters of the book (you can read here why we skipped some) is to really front load the culture before diving into reading. I also just bought books by Adriana Ramirez, Patricia Marti Torres, and Margarita Perez Garcia and they are filled with a ton of cultural references that I know most of my students would need to learn before we read the book to fully appreciate the plot. I also love how all of these authors provide a culture debrief and a letter to the students about why they wrote the book. I think understanding the author’s perspective and motivation to write a book can also drive students to have interest in what they are reading.
I hope these 5 Pre-reading strategies for World Language can inspire your kids to find some enjoyment in their reading this year, whether it be novels or simple short stories! If you have other ideas or things to share, send me a DM or email because I love learning from others and would love to hear from you.
