Facilitating Youth-Led Book Clubs as Transformative and Inclusive Spaces

Jody Polleck is an associate professor and the program coordinator for literacy education at Hunter College, City University of New York. She also continues to work in NYC schools as both a literacy coach and teacher.

Contents Acknowledgments xi 1. Transformation and Inclusivity: The Foundation for Student-Centered Book Clubs 1 What Has Been My Journey to Book Clubs? 3 What Are Book Clubs? 5 What Does It Mean to Be Transformative and Inclusive? 7 Why Do We Need Book Clubs? 8 What Are the Benefits of Book Clubs? 9 Who Are Book Clubs For? 10 What Are the Theories That Ground Book Clubs? 12 What's Coming Up? 15 2. Getting Book Clubs Started Within Our School Communities 18 Who Can Start and Facilitate Book Clubs? 19 What Is the Purpose of Your Book Clubs and Who Will Participate? 21 Where and When Do We Meet? 21 Which Books Do We Use and How Do We Get Them? 23 How Can We Be More Intentional About the Books We Read? 28 How Do We Get Students to Join Book Clubs? 30 How Do We Build Community to Prepare Students for Classroom-Based Book Clubs? 30 How Do We Build Literacy Skills to Prepare Students for Classroom-Based Book Clubs? 31 3. Creating Student-Centered, Inclusive Spaces Through Culturally Sustaining and Emotionally Responsive Facilitative Practices 36 What Does It Mean to Be a Culturally Sustaining and Emotionally Responsive Facilitator? 38 What Happens During Our First Book Club Session? 45 4. Maintaining, Sustaining, and Assessing Book Club Conversations 55 What Are the Structures We Can Use to Maintain Book Clubs? 57 What Are the Rituals We Can Use to Sustain Our Book Clubs? 66 What Mini-Lessons Can We Use to Sustain Our Book Clubs? 68 How Can We Nurture Students' Reading Outside of Book Club? 72 What Assessments Can We Use to Maintain and Sustain Student Progress? 74 5. Developing Literacies and Spaces for Emotional and Identity-Based Engagements 81 What Do We Mean By Literacy Development? 82 What Does It Mean to Engage in Emotional and Identity-Based Work? 86 How Can We Address Trauma Within Our Book Clubs? 93 How Do We Simultaneously Address Reading Development Along With Emotional and Identity-Based Work? 94 How Do We Integrate Writing Into Book Clubs? 101 6. Developing Students' Social Awareness, Interpersonal Relationships, and Agency 104 How Can We Use Book Clubs to Develop Students' Social Literacies? 106 How Can Book Clubs Center Social Awareness? 112 How Can Book Clubs Help Students Develop Relationships? 114 How Can We Use Book Clubs to Impact Students' Sense of Agency? 121 7. Engaging With Youth Families and in Digital Spaces 129 How Can Book Clubs Be Inclusive of Our Students' Families? 129 What Do Book Clubs Look Like in Digital Spaces? 133 Epilogue: Centering Joy in Book Club Spaces 138 References 143 Index 156 About the Author 164