I love the Book Club concept because it’s such an authentic reading and discussion activity – though perhaps in a classroom or library context, without the wine…
So I’ve decided to create some Book Club discussion questions to go with the free ‘summer special’ e-books – so far I’ve done questions for The English Chip and for Blood Kind.
Checking comprehension
Of course, if you need to check on general understanding before you get to the discussion, some fun ways could be:
- small groups act out the chapter they’ve just read
- one group writes comprehension questions for a chapter, then the other groups discuss and present their answers
- each person chooses a word or phrase that challenged them, researches it (or gets your help) and explains it to their group, or creates a small ‘post-it’ for the wall
Book Club questions
Beyond basic text comprehension, there are those questions that alert learners to the ‘unspoken’ parts of the narrative, where they have to make inferences or draw conclusions – and of course, share opinions.
I’ve created two sets of questions here. There are ‘chapter by chapter’ discussion points, if you’re reading in that way, and there are ‘whole of book’ Book Club questions, for learners who are reading the whole book at home, then discussing in class. The questions are at a strong intermediate level, but less confident learners should be able to join in.
Follow up activities
You could also do follow-up activities, like:
- planning the movie, and deciding on the setting
- writing the story (or at least some thoughts) from a different character’s perspective
- writing ‘Five years later – what I’m doing now’ from the main character
- having a mini-debate on why something is or is not a good idea
You probably have many other ideas that I haven’t thought of … enjoy!
