Teaching Resource
Talking About Books - Prompts
Prompts for students to use when orally discussing books.
Nurture a love of reading and expose your students to new books through book chats.
Encourage your students to use this checklist as a prompt when talking about books they’ve read. Use the prompts for either formal or informal chats about books. The teaching resource includes prompts for both fiction and non-fiction books.
These prompts are perfect to use in conjunction with other resources related to fostering a love of reading such as the Reading Preferences Survey or our Book Wish List.
For more ideas on reading engagement, visit our blog Reading Engagement in the Classroom| How to Foster a Love of Reading.
Common Core Curriculum alignment
- CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RL.2.2
Recount stories, including fables and folktales from diverse cultures, and determine their central message, lesson, or moral.
- CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RL.3.2
Recount stories, including fables, folktales, and myths from diverse cultures; determine the central message, lesson, or moral and explain how it is conveyed through key details in the text.
- CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.SL.2.2
Recount or describe key ideas or details from a text read aloud or information presented orally or through other media.
- CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.SL.3.4
Report on a topic or text, tell a story, or recount an experience with appropriate facts and relevant, descriptive details, speaking clearly at an understandable pace.
- CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.SL.4.1
Engage effectively in a range of collaborative discussions (one-on-one, in groups, and teacher-led) with diverse partners on grade 4 topics and texts, building on others' ideas and expressing their own clearly.
- CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.SL.4.4
Report on a topic or text, tell a story, or recount an experience in an organized manner, using appropriate facts and relevant, descriptive details to support main ideas or themes; speak clearly at an understandable pace.
- CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.SL.5.1
Engage effectively in a range of collaborative discussions (one-on-one, in groups, and teacher-led) with diverse partners on grade 5 topics and texts, building on others' ideas and expressing their own clearly.
- CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.SL.5.4
Report on a topic or text or present an opinion, sequencing ideas logically and using appropriate facts and relevant, descriptive details to support main ideas or themes; speak clearly at an understandable pace.

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