January 17th - Middle School Faculty

HBRMS Welcomes a New 7th grade Exploratory Course

Young Adult Literature

Reading should not be presented to children as a chore, a duty. It should be offered as a gift. 

—Kate DiCamillo

Who is that mystery reader?

Too often as adolescents become more involved in extracurricular activities and social lives; their reading begins to drop off.  To try and reverse this trend, the exploratory class Young Adult Literacy was designed to engage these readers and give them exposure to outstanding and  diverse current literature geared to middle school readers.  It is offered as a 7th grade exploratory and includes books from the Master List of the Illinois Caudill Book Award for  2020.  All of the books have been published in the last 5 years and were nominated by teachers, students and librarians from around the state to be considered for the award.  

Reading from this list gives students an opportunity to explore new genres and authors than they would not be  exposed to in their regular school day.  It is similar to a book club as a  part of their schedule. In addition to the 7th graders, the books are also offered to interested 6th and 8th grade students as well as students not currently in the class.  A few have even taken up the challenge to read all 20 from the list.

Some of the titles offered for the course

"There is more treasure in books than in all the pirate's loot on Treasure Island." 

– Walt Disney

Reading and discussion in class

In class, students read and discuss at least 3 of the books from the Master List per quarter with the opportunity to read more.   The class explores one book as a larger group and students then choose to go on to read two more either on their own or in small groups.  They are given flexibility in book choices and how they break the book into smaller reading assignments.   

Besides reading and discussing the books as a larger group,  the students film short videos about what they read, create book trailers to advertise the books, and use art to present key ideas from the books .  

Mrs. Edwards 

7th & 8th grade ELA and Young Adult Literature teacher

More of the list's selections

“I enjoy making an Animoto after I have read the book” Grace B. 

Animoto is a cloud-based video creation service that produces video from photos, video clips, and music into video slideshows, and customized web-based presentations

“I like that you don’t have to worry about anything else except enjoying reading the book presenting what the book was about.”  Johanna G. 

“I like how relaxing and calming the class can be while we are reading and discussing.”  McKenna B. 

“I like how interesting the books are and how I have a choice of which book to read.”  Evan D. 

“The class has been and excellent addition to our 7th grade exploratory rotation.  The students are enjoying their opportunity to share their reading and thinking with others.”  
Jeff Strouss
HBRMS Principal