Week Two: Creating a culture of reading

I think that it is important to create a culture of reading in the classroom because as Language Arts teachers we want to make students lifelong readers. In order to do this you need to provide students with the necessary skills and tools to access a text. To create this culture you first need to teach reading strategies so students can engage and connect with a book.
You also need to provide them with opportunities to read books that they are interested in. I think a classroom library would be essential to have to give students access to texts and the school library should also be visited regularly. Also i think a teacher could create lists of books with similar themes for students to choose from based on their own interests. Often a student doesn't realize that there are books that can relate to their lives. For example, Mike Lupica has written many great novels about sports which students love to read.
Going along with this I think independent reading logs and projects are a good way to promote reading outside of school. In my internship I have seen a huge push for independent reading. Students are required to submit a weekly log of their reading and each trimester they are required to complete a project on one of the books they have read on their own. I also think it is important as a teacher to show your own interest in reading to students. I think you could give book talks to your students to show you also read outside of class.