Motivating Kids with Accelerated Reader

Does your school have school wide goals for reading?  This year, our school is really pushing Accelerated Reader!  I think by the 3rd month of school, we read over 20,000 books as a school of 1,500 kids! In 2nd grade, our Reading Specialist has set the goal of reading 40 books by the end of the year.  That's great for my readers, but nearly impossible for some of my students and I don't feel so good about that so I'm here to talk to you about a goal I'd like to set to help my kiddos reach their goals {Say that 3 times real fast}!

  I think if used correctly, this program can be wonderful.  Not sure what Accelerated Reader, or AR is?  It's basically an online data base of thousands of quizzes that go along with the books your students are reading.  It tests their comprehension, vocal, and a bunch of other things.  We only use the comprehension component. 

So back to the 40 books per year goal.  I'm all for goal-setting, but if done the correct way.  Sometimes I worry that we are too focused on reading the goal and we lose focus of the purpose, which is reading.  As I've sat on this topic since the middle of the last  school year, I haven't loved this idea because I think some kids get too caught up on the goal and then they read books far below their level just so they can meet their goal and get their prize.  On the other end of the spectrum, my struggling readers hardly even attempt to take AR quizzes because the goal seems so far off.  This goal shouldn't be looked at as a perfect fit for every type of student, you know! Can you relate?

So here's what I'm going  to implement when we head back to school!  I am going to use a goal tracking chart that shows where kiddos are to reach their school-wide goal, but I'm also going to have them set their own personal goal.  That way, my higher friends will challenge themselves and my needier friends will feel successful.  It's a win-win for everyone in my book!

The colored columns represent our school wide goals that I mentioned above.  I think what I'm going to do is give each child a star sticker to place on the chart for the goal they'd like to attain.  Once they attain that goal, they'll place another chart further on the chart.  I'm hopeful that this new way of setting goals will work wonders for my kids and help them all feel successful.  After all, the true goal in this whole little contest my school has thought up is to be reading, right?  If they're reading, I'm happy!  Want you own copy of an editable reading tracker, get it here!

Join a few more of us teachers who have some great ideas about planning and goal setting in the new year!

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