Who Am I as a Reader?

In Chap. 2 , I chronicle the first three lessons. The sequence centres on drawing students’ attention to themselves as readers and their reading habits. It deliberately positions them as students who belong to a community of readers with some similar and some diverse reading preferences. The work brings printed books as physical art-objects to the forefront of classroom reading encounters. The theory and significance of motivation and students’ volitional agency is highlighted with reference to Dewey’s (1934) and Matusov’s (2009) work. A set of activities focused on initiating, stimulating and inspiring book talk is described as students begin to perceive their sense of self as a reader. The importance of a dialogic pedagogy to students’ reading engagement is discussed with reference to various authors including Ursula K. Le Guin and Leo Tolstoy. A key learning objective is how to talk about books and book preferences.