Our experience of Academic Reading Circles
3. Different groups read different books.
4. Groups meet on a regular, predictable schedule to discuss their reading.
5. Students use written or drawn notes to guide both their reading and discussion.
6. Discussion topics come from students.
7. Discussion meetings aim to be open, natural conversations about books, so personal connections, digressions, and open-ended questions are welcome.
8. The teacher serves as a facilitator, not a group member or instructor.
9. Evaluation is by teacher observation and student self-evaluation.
10. A spirit of playfulness and fun pervades the room.
11. When books are finished, readers share with their classmates and then new groups form around new reading choices.
In the fields of language teaching, content-based provision and English for Academic Purposes( EAP), however, reading circles have been used with varying degrees of learner autonomy, especially when it comes to choice of text / genre of text, group make-up or follow-up activities. Practitioners have highlighted the potential for more tutor intervention when considering the appropriacy of the reading text( s) vis-àvis learners’ language and content needs( Furr, 2004; Shelton-Strong, 2012; Seburn, 2015), reading circles membership and its impact on learner motivation( Furr, 2004), as well as the range of follow-up reading, speaking, writing or feedback activities and their link to the learners’ academic development and performance( Gore- Loyd, 2015; Schoonmaker, 2014; Seburn, 2015). Nonetheless, reading circles have been seen as“ democratic” and enabling spaces( Williams, 2007, p. 42) that allow for contributions from each member at a pace, level of complexity and depth of engagement that they are comfortable with.
In terms of the degree of tutor participation in reading circles, it is most prominent in the support provided in the preparatory stage, although facilitating discussions and follow-up activities is also important. The reading support, which usually involves role assignment, scaffolds learners’ communicative competence by providing them with an interpretative lens through which to approach the text and shape their contributions in the peer-led discussion. The number and scope of possible roles vary among practitioners; however, as can be seen in Table 1, the range used in literature circles( LCs), content-based reading circles( CBRCs) and academic reading circles( ARCs) covers the full spectrum of reading skills, i. e., decoding / bottom-up linguistic processing( e. g.,“ Word wizard”,“ Literary luminary”/“ Highlighter”), global text comprehension / top-down interpretation( e. g.,“ Discussion leader”,“ Summariser”), and ability to integrate text( s) into existing knowledge( e. g.,“ Connector”,“ Investigator”/“ Contextualiser”). Moreover, irrespective of which roles are selected for a reading circle, it is worth noting that they should address the key cognitive and metacognitive processes involved in reading comprehension and monitoring as outlined in Palinscar and Brown’ s reciprocal reading model( 1984), i. e., summarising, clarifying, questioning and predicting. In this way, reading circles not only aim to enhance learners’ reading comprehension, but also develop metacognitive strategies that can help overcome comprehension failures, improve retention and support long-term study.
Our experience of Academic Reading Circles
We have used Seburn’ s adaptation of ARCs in foundation( FY), undergraduate( UG) and postgraduate( PGT) programmes which prepare students for academic study in Arts and Humanities and Social Sciences. As these pre-sessional and in-sessional programmes are often based on content which has been carefully chosen to develop students’ language and academic literacy skills in a specific discipline, the texts we use for the ARCs tend to be chosen by us rather than by the students, for 18