Reinventing the Reading Journal

Pre Pandemic, my literacy instruction followed the Readers Workshop model. Reading journals were essential to the success of my instruction. This fall I worked with my friend and fellow blogger, Ann Williams to create this journal to support her fourth graders with reading instruction. While this journal has worked well for Ann’s fourth graders, we had to prefill it for the year with what we wanted to be linked in the journal in order for the students to have access to everything they would need. During this unique time, this worked fine, however we knew there had to be a better way.

Recently I learned of a way to create a journal which would support teachers pushing out content to the journal pages in real time. In order to do this, teachers must set up a teacher copy and student copy of the journal. I have modeled the steps in the short clips below while creating this reading journal to use with a student interest book group who will be reading The Lightning Thief by Rick Riordan.

Step 1: Create a teacher template.

Create a Google Slideshow with a name to indicate this is your “teacher copy”
Format your Slideshow. I prefer to use the custom setting to make the journal to look like a piece of paper (8.5 x 11)
Add multiple BLANK slides . Your slideshow should have enough slides for the entire novel study

Step 2: Create your student template

Create a Google Slideshow with a name to indicate this is your “student copy”
Format your Slideshow. I prefer to use the custom setting to make the journal to look like a piece of paper (8.5 x 11)

Step 3: Link your slideshows

In your teacher copy, highlight ALL slides and file→ copy
PASTE all slides into your student copy
When prompted, LINK the slides

Step 4: Assign to students

Before assigning in Google Classroom, you will need to “share” the TEACHER copy with your students. This assures that your slides will be linked when the ownership changes in Classroom. Students will not open this shared copy.

Assign in Google Classroom, choosing make a copy for each student
Each student will need their own copy of your slideshow

Step 5: Update

When you’re ready to “push out” new content, update the appropriate slide in your teacher copy
Students will see an UPDATE button on their copy on the slide that you updated in your teacher copy