LLSS 528 Getting Started With Literature Circles Chapter 5

"Talking is one of our most personal and natural responses to reading."

I love how this chapter starts. Discussion is at the heart of literature circles and an effective discussion helps people experience literature in a more rich way so the question is, what are you trying to accomplish in your discussion? There should be goals for both yourself and your students and those goals should be known by all. If you're not sure on where to start with goals, why not just ask your students, "Why do we talk about books?" I bet 9 times out of 10 you'll get valuable and personal goals that can easily relate to the discussion. 

If this is a group that is new to discussion, you may want to start with a mini lesson on discussion skills where you address the following questions: 

What do I talk about?

How do I gather information to share?

How do I participate in a discussion?

Once this is established, the most important question for kids to answer is, "What is meaningful to you?" The book suggests straying away from the status quo questions because the whole point is for students to bring their own ideas, puzzlements, discoveries, and insights to the discussion. If you ask the same old, "What's the theme" and "What is the mood?" your discussions will get boring quick. Rather, have kids start by sharing their favorite part of the chapter or pose a question they want answered. One great and obvious way to start is, "What did you think of the story?" but to get a real conversation going goes beyond this by providing students with quotes and questions, prompts, guided topics, and student generated questions. 

Unfortunately it is not a reality that all students will get their own personal copy of the discussion book to underline and write notes in, so another great way to make notes as your read is with post-it notes. Another way is with bookmarks or discussion logs. I personally prefer the post-it method. 

Student must also be taught how to participate in a discussion so show through brainstorming what works in a discussion and what doesn't. Kids work in groups starting in elementary school so you'll be pleasantly surprised with the expectations the students set for themselves and let discussion guidelines stem from this. 

When assessing individuals during discussions look for:

Asking questions 

Listening actively

Thoughtful response

Predicting (noticing foreshadowing)

Retelling - main ideas and supporting details

Supporting ideas and opinions with text

Elements of literature (plot, setting, etc)

Making personal connections

Connecting to other books

Lastly, don't forget to ask your students what worked well for them during discussions and what was difficult. Then build on those answers during the next discussion.