Reading response journal activities for book report alternatives, ELA lesson plans

March is National Reading Month, starting with the NEA's "Read Across America." Looking for ideas to inspire a life-long love of books? Here are reading response activities, interactive ELA (English language arts) lessons, book-based crafts and literature response lessons. Book activities are hands-on, multi-sensory, cross-curricular Montessori-style. Use for interactive Readers Workshop, special education students, reluctant readers, divergent learners and summer reading enrichment.

Reading response journal. Have kids create personalized reading logs, respond to literature and complete book-based activities. Check off ELA activities as completed. Check out my other post for a reading response journal rubric. 

Homemade books. Cut book covers from cereal box. Cover with scrap wrapping paper or wallpaper. Cover with magazine picture collage. Decoupage by painting pictures with watered-down school glue, front and back. Cut lined paper pages (for text) and blank paper (for illustrations). Or use scrap paper and draw in text lines. These make great hands on reading response activities for readers workshop and writers workshop. They are the perfect book report alternative for English language arts lesson plans. 

Book-based promotional materials. Have kids play marketer for their favorite book or author. Make posters, book covers advertising literature. Create 3-D sculptures, models or dioramas based on books. Make book-based merchandise: toys, snacks, food, games. In homeschooling, my 6th grade son designed a "Hobbit Holes" cereal box designed on his favorite J.R.R. Tolkien novel.

Book diorama book report alternative. Create scenes from books using recycled products. Arrange scene in shoe box. Use small dolls (Lego, Fisher-Price, Little Tikes, Polly Pockets) as characters.

Story-reading audio/video presentations. Using cellphones, have students create videos of themselves reading books. Encourage them to create a literature podcasts or vlogs. Upload videos to Youtube or Tik Tok. Reading aloud boosts confidence in ELA subject matter. 

Story-telling. Students read aloud to younger students. Students act out children's books and present to younger or special needs classes. In high school, our oldest daughter acted out a Shel Silverstein's poem "Noise Day" for special education kids. They loved when she skateboarded across the stage! Talk about an interactive reading response activity! 

Book-music connections. Create music playlists based on books. Select metaphorical songs. Kids will love choosing modern songs to represent story themes. Our family saw a production of "Macbeth." The play was set to Lady Gaga's "Bad Romance," "The Decemberists "This is Why We Fight" and "Ain't No Rest for the Wicked" by Cage the Elephant. It really resonated with students and helped them understand and relate to Shakespeare. Plays and music help connect English language art activities to life. 

Help students brainstorm on creative book report alternatives and reading response activites. 

Free Printable Reading Response Journal Rubric

Looking for creative ways to teach reading or literature units? Use reading response journals. Here's a template to make student reading response journal. Use for English, ELA (English language arts), literature, reading and writing classes. Use for Readers Workshop (a popular interactive reading group method used in elementary and middle school). Here's the reading response journal format.

Give each student a single subject notebook (wireless notebooks work best). Use the same one for all lesson plans or start a new one for each unit or book genre study. In middle and high school, students should make separate response journals for longer books and more comprehensive literature studies. All written assignments are completed in this notebook (except a final project).

Create a blocked calendar chart, like a bingo card, with 5 columns and 5 rows of squares. Label columns with main components of ELA curriculum: reading, writing, speaking, listening and multisensory response. Label rows with higher order thinking skills (HOTS): Recall/Comprehension, Analysis (structure), Applications (text to text, text-to-life connections), Synthesis (text to new use), Evaluation (thoughts, feelings, opinions, rationale).

Write 25 literature response activities for a month or of assignments. List one assignment per box. Leave room to write in specifics. Photocopy (students complete similar activities for each book or genre studied). Attach to inside front cover of journal.

Tailor activities to state objectives, and student ability. Make it flexible enough for special needs accommodations and student learning styles, Give options. Let students choose 22 out of the 25 activities and do the last three for extra credit if desired. Students may complete assignments in any order. They can double up on slower days and skip assignments on busier days.

Each assignment should take 30 minutes to complete: two paragraphs of writing or 30 minutes of reading, speaking and listening. Assignments are completed in the notebook, labeled according by chosen activity and dated.

Initial completed activities in each box and note the points (in pen). Make notes or correction on the response page. Keep copies of each students chart for your records or keep digital copies. Each activity is worth 30 points: 18 points for content and quality, 7 for mechanics (spelling, punctuation and grammar), 3 for neatness/clarity, 1 for being on time (calculated at the end of the month) and 1 for proper labeling. (name, date, class, period),