Biblionasium: Engaging Students in the Reading Process through Social Interactions and Challenges

What is Biblionasium?

​Biblionasium is a reading-focused social network designed specifically for kids ages 6-13. With Biblionasium, students build their very own book shelf – a safe space to keep track of what they’ve read and what they want to read. Within Biblionasium, students can share and receive book recommendations from the classmates, get coaching from fun mascot Chip Manzee, and be motivated by custom reading challenges.

Why use it?

Short version: 
Humans are social by nature.  Giving students a voice in their reading community is essential for a life-long love of learning. The more students discuss and share what they are reading, the more they will read. 

Long version from Biblionasium:
Biblionasium is a fun and engaging reading community that will help you connect to your students outside of the classroom.  You can setup your favorite books and recommended lists on virtual bookshelves that will be available to your students at all times. Students can email you their reading logs instead of handing them in on paper; you can set up fun challenges and rewards that will help encourage your students to keep reading, and you can set up a reading list that the students won’t lose. It brings children together and gives them a chance to easily recommend books to each other.

Biblionasium offers numerous benefits to educators:

• Reading program customization and differentiation: With Biblionasium, you can tailor reading programs to the individual needs of each student. You can even administer programs and fun reading challenges by group, class, grade, individual student, or reading level.
• Easy, effective data tracking: Actionable data is finally at your fingertips. Biblionasium provides reports that track what each student is reading and at what level, using Lexile® measures. Reports are available for groups, classes, grade levels, or individual students.
• Student-to-student support network: Students are encouraged to recommend their favorite books to their classmates, receive reading ideas from their friends, and generally interact with reading material like never before.
• Simple organization support: No more lost notes or reading logs; with Biblionasium, everything is stored online. Better yet – it’s all accessible online anytime, 24/7.
• Entertaining, positive, and immediate feedback: Chip Manzee, Biblionasium’s reading coach and mascot, helps students understand good reading behavior while motivating them to succeed. Additional positive reinforcement opportunities are available through fun games and reading challenges, with built-in support for goal- or reward-setting.
• Collaboration with parents and family:  Foster a strong connection between the library, the classroom, and home with Biblionasium. Biblionasium allows parents to stay connected to educators by accessing their child’s recommended, required, and favorite book lists. Parents and family members can take an active role in motivating students to read.

Follett Destiny and Biblionasium Integration

One of the best parts of Biblionasium is that it is now partnered with Follett (our online catalog)! When students make reviews of books we have in our library, it will now show up for others to see when searching in our catalog.  This makes Biblionasium an even more authentic learning platform for students because they can help others in our school find books by reviewing books for our students, staff, and parents. I can't wait to try this out more during our spring semesters.

Parents can join in on the fun too!

Unlike Accelerated Reader where students cannot access their information or take quizzes from home, students are able to access and participate in Biblionasium from home.  By accessing the site at home, a love of reading can be fostered in the home as well as in school.

Teachers, please feel free to use this letter to send home to parents so they can participate as well.

biblionasium_letter_home.pdf
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Scaffolding Resource

​Our students often need scaffolding for typing answers online because this is new to a lot of them.  I created a book review sheet for students to complete during a lesson, Writer's Workshop, or morning work before they can review a book on Biblionasium.  I think this helps model the expectations of what to write online and how to stay in an academic mode when socializing on an educational website (because we all know the moment students get to go online, they tend to fall into the 'lol' zone).  Switching between academic and social language is a difficult skill to learn.  By giving students an outline of expectations first, we are helping them learn that when they are online, there are different expectations when typing for an educational purpose and when playing POV games with friends.

​What do I do?

1st
​
Log into Biblionasium by clicking on "login with Destiny" at the top of the page

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2nd

Search for "Richmond Hill Elementary, Richmond Hill, GA" and click the "Log In" button when you find it

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3rd

Log in using your Follett account information
Username: lunch number
​Password: lunch number

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Finally

Start using the site! 

Take a look around and get to know the site. Search for your favorite books and add them to your bookshelf. Start a reading challenge with your students (how many minutes can you read in a week?). Look at the book reviews your students have written already! 

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Walk Through