Poster Session: Promote reading! Challenge your students through Book Trailers and Readers' Cup

Leanne McDougal

Leanne acknowledged that the idea for a Reader's Cup actually came fron South Australia originally.

Readers' Cup

• Runs it only in her school
• Groups of 4-5 students from Years 5 -7. She includes Year 5 students so they get experience in it ready for Year 6&7
  
• They read 5-6 books (including one picture book). Titles chosen need to be suitable for girls and boys. It could include a graphic novel or even a movie. Example of titles chosen - The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, 68 Teeth, Blueback, A Horse Called Elvis, Rowan of Rin.
  
• Creates a flyer to advertise for participants. They have 2 weeks then to form teams.
• Has 12 copies of books on the list for the Cup. Students can borrow only one at a time for one week. They have 6-8 weeks to read all the books.
  
• Teams meet and formulate questions to ask each other about the books.
• She formulates around 5 factual questions about the books (and records the page number where the answer can be found in case of dispute). Total number of questions is 25. They may be questions with multiple answers e.g. Give 2 of the reasons why ... . Has a PowerPoint presentation of the questions. Need a couple of extra questions in case of need for tie-break.
• Competition run at night 6:00 - 7:00 so parents can attend.
  
• Students write answers on paper which are then marked by judges. Two points given to each question. Students have 30 seconds to discuss answer in team then one person writes answer on paper. Hand up after every 5 questions. Announce total number of points per team at half way mark. Winning team is awarded a perpetual trophy cup (engraved with names of winning team) and each team member receives a medallion.
• The winning team goes on to join a state competition organised by the Queensland branch of the Children's Book Council of Australia.

Book Trailer (like a movie trailer but about a book)

• Lots of examples on Youtube
• Use Moviemaker or Photostory
• Choose book to make trailer about - a video advertisement for a book. Analyse the book - is it good, interesting, unique ...? Show what its about without giving away the ending
• 1-2 mins in length
• Need script in Word document. Not too much text as this is used in print or sound format to sell the book. What is exciting to hook people in?
  
• Storyboard - Find or make a small number of images to capture the essence of the story. Can scan pics, use claymation or Lego, act out and video, photos
• Find or make appropriate sound effects or music.
  
• Open Moviemaker - drag and drop images, create transitions. Students must cite where images are if they have been sourced from somewhere.
• Type in words, put in pictures and instrumental music (no words)
• Music - freeplaymusic.com, incompetech?, www.a1freesoundeffects.com
  
• Takes about a term
• Rubric assessment
• Students really enjoy making them.