On a brief note, I was surprised by the overall negative reaction to Socratic Seminars this past week in class. Everyone's past bad experiences and skepticism with this method of learning made me think again about the value of the Socratic Seminar. Are they really that bad? It seemed kind of like a good idea to me.
On to books clubs, the primary focus for the week. I really enjoyed the guest librarian who came and spoke with us about book clubs, primarily for teens, in the AADL system. She brought some books with her focusing on topics such as good books for a fantasy book club, or good recipes to make for this book club. I enjoyed rifling through the pages of these books for fun, and I am looking forward to checking them out for further perusal. She also talked about ways in which to spice up the book club. Some of her suggestions included creating a playlist based on the book and skyping the author, or listening to an author interview online. I like all of these ideas. As a future librarian possibly going to take on a teen book club, I think the idea of a playlist would especially connect with teens, and skyping the author would bring more meaning to the book under discussion. And of course, food can only be a good thing. There are so many possibilities and ideas to bring to a book club, all of which can offer more insights and meaning to the book under discussion.
As for the book club we have to prepare for class as an assignment, I have just finished reading the stories for my book club group, and I am certainly intrigued. Between stories about a computer taking over the world and a tiger who teaches a princess about love, I am rather looking forward to my group's book club discussions. I am curious about which audience each book club/story will be directed towards, and what techniques each group will use to promote discussion and bring more insights to the reading material. This will help me to decide which techniques are the most interesting for members of the book club and what will work well to promote more helpful discussion.
Interestingly enough, many of your cohort have already blogged about the readings, even though you guys are the last to host your clubs!
ReplyDeleteI have decided that there is some kind of psychological test that we can derive from people's reactions to various moments of the last class. Some hated SS and loved the AADL ideas; some wanted more from AADL and loved SS. I am sure we will become millionaires when we can discover the pattern! :)
Some classmates were a bit harsh on Socratic Seminar, weren't they? What I think it comes down to is how good the instructor is at balancing leading and letting participants talk, and maybe more important how willing the participants are to truly engage.
ReplyDeleteThe speaker from AADL was excellent and gave great tips and ideas about hosting book clubs in libraries. I also enjoyed her idea about having a playlist of related songs, and have even thought prior to hearing this about what books/stories pair well with a particular song. I'm a lyrics and word person so this idea really got me thinking more about it.
You're selections for group sound great--I may have to check them out when I have downtime. The whole list by the class seems solid so I may start working my way through the other readings in what little free time I can find.