Bookcasts!

What is a bookcast? Exploring the Reading in Action website may help you find out!

Reading in Action is an interesting site with a lot of possibilities. One of the most appealing aspects of the site is that there are separate sections to provide activities for children, “tweens,” and teens. While many of the types of activities are similar, the specification for age and ability really help when trying to find appropriate activities for your specific students.

I was initially drawn to the site by the Bookcasts, which are essentially podcasts of book reviews. These Bookcasts are again divided into separate sections for children, tweens, and teens, but there is also a section here for award winning books. Many of the Children’s Bookcasts have videos to accompany the description of the story, and these videos range from music with pictures, to a narration from the main character, to an explanation from the author about how he or she wrote the book. If there isn’t a video, there is still an audio clip with similar information.

The Tween Bookcasts are primarily audio clips, but there are some video clips in this section as well. The video clips range, again, from book trailer videos to author commentaries.

The Teen Bookcasts contain a combination of audio and video clips, but one thing that stood out to me here was the presence of book talks in the video clips. This could be used to demonstrate good book talks before having students actually do their own!