Recently, uber-dedicated
teacher-librarian Meredith Inkeles let me know how much 5
Kinds of Nonfiction and the related Book Match Survey had transformed the way she thinks about sharing nonfiction with
students. She told me a wonderful story about one of her 6th-grade
readers, and I invited her to write this blog post so more educators could see
the important role nonfiction can play in their students’ lives.
Thank you, Meredith! This is such helpful
information.
At
the beginning of each school year, I give all of my students the Reading Genre
Personality Quiz by MrsReaderPants to find out what kinds of books
interest them most. The students enjoy answering the questions and discovering
their genre personality for fiction books. The students take this quiz from third
to sixth grade; it gets updated, and I tell them it is fun to see how their
preferences change as they get older.
But
until I read 5 Kinds of Nonfiction:
Enriching Reading and Writing Instruction with Children’s Books by Melissa Stewart and Marlene Correia,
I never thought to ask my students about their nonfiction reading
preferences. How many students had I missed giving the right book by focusing
on fiction and ignoring nonfiction?
For
me, the clincher was this sentence from page 45 of 5 Kinds of Nonfiction: “When it comes to reading for pleasure, you
may not turn to nonfiction, but . . . many of your students will—if they’re
given the chance.”
To
remedy my oversight, I decided to have my sixth-grade students take this Book Match Survey created by Marlene and available for
FREE on Melissa’s website.
One
of the questions asks, “Who are some famous people (past or present) that you
admire?” Most of the students’ responses were typical of 11 and 12-year-olds,
but one stood out: Selena Quintanilla, the beloved Tejano musician who was
killed in 1995 when she was just 23 years old.
As I read the student’s survey, I remembered that he’d asked me if I had any Selena
books a few weeks earlier. He must be a major fan. Clearly, I needed to get him
at least one book. He later let me know that his classroom teacher had Who Was Selena? by Kate Bisantz, but
another student knew how much he wanted to read the book and purposely kept it
from him.
I had already sent out all my book
orders for the school year, but that didn’t stop me. I was determined to fill
in this gap in the library’s collection and provide books on the much-desired
topic for my student. So I purchased three biographies: Who Was Selena? by Kate Bisantz, Selena: Queen of Tejano Music by Silvia Lopez, and Sing with Me: The Story of Selena Quintanilla
by Diana Silvia.
When the books arrived, I immediately processd them. The next day, I found the
student as the buses were unloading and asked him to come to the library. The
moment he saw the books, his eyes and smile went wide. You would have thought I
was handing over a million dollars and an entire bag of candy instead of three
biographies!
I was
curious to know more about how this 11 year old became such an avid Selena fan,
so I sat down with him and asked during library class. His whole face lit up as
he explained: One day he was watching TV with his dad, and they stumbled upon the
movie Selena from 1997. He asked if
it was about Selena Gomez. but then realized it couldn’t be because the movie
came out when Selena Gomez was only 5 years old.
Next, he asked his grandmother about Selena Quintanilla and began listening to her
music. He’s become somewhat of an expert on Selena’s life and tragic death.
He’s even viewed the crime scene photos
online and knows all of the details about Selena’s killer, who was the
president of the Selena fan club.
I’d
heard other students making fun of this boy for being so passionate and
knowledgeable about Selena, so I asked him how it made him feel to know that we
now have three Selena books in the library. I was expecting him say he felt
validated or seen. Instead, he said he felt good about asking for them because
now other students can also learn about Selena and her story. He was pleased to
hear that other students had already checked out the books.
This
experience with nonfiction and getting to know my students better has left me
overjoyed and excited to continue this nonfiction exploration. Reading 5 Kinds of Nonfiction and using the
related resources has allowed me to experience my students’ love of nonfiction
books and expanded my thinking about the role of nonfiction in the library.
Meredith Inkeles is a Nationally Board
Certified Library Media Teacher at the Wappingers Central School District’s
Kinry Road Elementary School in New York State’s Hudson Valley. Meredith is in
her twenty-fourth year as a teacher-librarian and cannot wait to share more
nonfiction with her students.
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