<![CDATA[Disadvantages of Book Talks]]>What is a Book Talk? A book talk is an opportunity for a student to complete a presentation on a book that they have read. At our school, students are given approximately 1 month to read a book, take notes, and create a PowerPoint presentation.

In our English department, the presentation calls for a literary analysis of the text, personal connection, a creative or visual representation, and to divulge key highlights of the plot. My favorite part about the Book Talks is that students self select a novel; they are encouraged to read a novel they enjoy. Wonderful! In an ideal school, all students would read books they love, and then eagerly analyze them till the end.  Am I getting bobbing heads from some educators out there? Reads well on a blog post, eh? In practise, book talks have but one advantage:student self selection.

Many tweens are conniving, cunning, and know how to cut corners. Don’t assume the worst: I love all the students being educated in room 414, but I am also not a moron.  Here’s to the disadvantages of Book Talks and a possible solution to the problem here.

Many students are not reading their self selected novels, in fact, several are utilizing their Google skills to sparknote, copy and paste literary elements. I should have known that students would use the wonders of the internet, because when I did the book talk myself, I found myself Googling answers for World War Z. Funny, isn’t it? Adults might even find ways to shortcut. The worst part of all of this is students are copying/pasting, reading summaries, and not reading their Book Talk book.

Again, I don’t want to generalize: not every student is cutting corners, but its the ones who need to read that are doing so.

Students are copying and pasting from the internet. Great, so the purpose of book talks is sort of lost, isn’t it? With the real objective being to instill a love of reading into kids, the purpose behind book talks becomes meaningless when the book is not being read.

Time is super important for an educator that is trying to meet curricular objectives. Book talk presentations suck up 2 blocks of 45 minutes, 20 times a year. That’s a lot of time dedicated to presenting in front of the class.

The above information hopefully illustrates why I will not be running book talks next year, simply put: it takes too much time and its too easy to cheat. I am still in the midst of my brainstorming and planning for next school year, read a post about my solution to this problem here.

 

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