Homeschool Book Club

Opens Doors To Reading

A homeschool book club is always a favorite activity. It fits neatly into a regular homeschool co-op schedule and appeals to youngsters and parents alike. Most importantly, it offers special opportunities for homeschool children to read for pleasure, use their imaginations and offer their thoughts.

A Mom or older teen leads the group. She is responsible for choosing books, having discussion questions prepared, and any other activity related to the literature.

The moderator should have several selections in mind, then ask for input from other Moms. Get an early start and prepare a complete list of the volumes and the months for which they are assigned. Knowing ahead of time which stories will be read allows families to make purchases in the most expedient manner. Check out combining orders for a discount!

The material for the homeschool book club should be classics, stories of saints and heroes, historical fiction--interesting and appealing to both boys and girls, but not too difficult or heavy. The youngsters should understand and enjoy the works.

The aim here is to encourage reading and the expression of ideas.

Please check the recommended reading lists for 8-12 years and 13-16 years for suggestions.

Ideas to consider:

• Meet monthly.

• Generally, group the children according to age...and try to have a comfortable number. If there are too many or if there's a wide variety of ages, another volunteer(s) can have a separate group(s).

• The homeschool book club meeting should be a total of thirty to forty-five minutes.

• This is not a classroom or an English/reading lesson; the purpose is different.

  To repeat, book club is to emphasize reading for pleasure, then talking about it. The group also offers the opportunity to learn to listen to others. The atmosphere is polite, relaxed and fun.

• Attempt to engage each child. If one seems shy or uncomfortable, at first just ask for concurrence. "John, do you think the hero was brave, too?"

• Topics to open start discussion--"Can someone tell us the plot?" "Who's your favorite character" "Why" "What do you think was the most exciting part?" "Has anything like this ever happened to you?" "Do you think this (name a point you want them to think about) is good, helpful, bad, mean, etc?" "Can you relate this to anything going on currently?"

  This is their club. Get them to do the thinking and talking.

• Children appreciate having a record of what they read. One way is for them to examine the front of the book, then design and draw another cover. Allot 15 minutes or so (experiment with the amount of time needed for a particular group/they could finish at home). The title, author and date should be added. Older youth could even make short notes about on the back about theme, characters, plot, etc.

  As an alternative, encourage the children to use their imagination--they could draw and color a favorite scene or character, again labeling it with the title, author and date.

• At the end of the year, ask the youngsters for literature suggestions for the following year.

A homeschool book club is an awesome experience for all. So much literature...so many ideas...you are opening a magic, wondrous world.

Reading: The Key to Adventure

Reading: A Boredom Buster!

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