Sustained Silent Reading at Frederick County Middle School

During my first two years as a middle school librarian, sixth and seventh grade students visited the library and checked out books on a regular basis.  I’m sure many of them read the books they checked out, but there were also many who didn’t.  I knew this needed to change, but I wasn’t exactly sure how to make the change.

In the summer of 2014, I read Reading in the Wild by Donalyn Miller and attended one of her sessions at Lord Fairfax Community College.  I quickly realized that one of the simplest ways to encourage students to read wildly was to read wildly myself, and to share my wild reading adventures with them.  I set a goal.  I would read 45 books during the 2014-15 school year.  I created a bulletin board in the library, told the students about my goal, started reading and created this blog.  

At the Virginia Association of School Librarians Annual Conference in November 2014, I attended a session about Sustained Silent Reading at the Secondary Level and heard Stephen Krashen speak.  Inspired, I returned to school, and ordered The Power of Reading by Stephen Krashen, The Book Whisperer by Donalyn Miller, and Readicide:  How Schools Are Killing Reading and What You Can Do About It by Kelly Gallagher.  

I spent the next several months researching the benefits of silent reading and let the information marinade in my brain.  Finally, I reached a conclusion.  In order for our students to become better readers, they needed to read material of their choice, simply for the sake of reading.  In order to read, our students needed to have time to read.  We could give them that time.

I prepared a presentation about the importance of silent reading and sent it to our administrators.  I sent an abbreviated version of the presentation to our teachers. We discussed how silent reading could be implemented at our school at a faculty meeting.  

Starting today, everyone in our school,  students, administration, and staff, will spend the first 15 minutes of every day reading material of their choice.  

All students visited the library last week, and everyone checked out reading material.  A “Free Books” shelf has been established in the library, and several teachers have visited to take reading material for their classrooms.  

We are ready to read.