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listening

Five Ways Educators Can Leverage Virtual Author Talks to Boost Literacy This School Year

by Miguel Guhlin August 8, 2024

written by Miguel Guhlin

Did you know that only 43% of children aged 8-18 enjoy reading? That number is down from 58% in 2016 (source). What’s more, both American 9- and 13-year-olds who read for fun on a daily basis has dropped to the lowest level since the mid-1980s (source). The good news is that virtual author talks offer a way to spark students’ interest in reading. Let’s explore a possible resource that can enhance literacy in classrooms. At the end of this blog, I’ll also remind you about AI narrated audiobooks that are currently available. What’s more, this blog will introduce you to a free-for-US-schools tool for human-narrated audio books.

Here are five ways educators can harness virtual author talks to enhance literacy in their classrooms this school year.

1. Integrate Author Talks into Your Curriculum

“How can educators effectively integrate author talks into their curriculum to maximize the benefits for their students?” you might ask. One way is to use services like BookBreak.org.

BookBreak is a platform created and developed by the industry-leading Library Speakers Consortium, which has many years of experience working with authors and publishers in delivering amazing online programs. It makes it easy to bring authors into the classroom and that can boost student engagement with literature:

Screenshot by author of The Library District, Las Vegas-Clark County — Screenshot by author of **The Library District, Las Vegas-Clark County**

“BookBreak brings 2-4 bestselling elementary and middle school authors to schools each month via live stream. Events are geared toward specific grade cohorts such as K-2nd, 3rd-5th and 6th-8th. Each grade level has the opportunity to hear from an age-appropriate author at least once per month throughout the school year. Recordings of the talks are also available on our platform. The live events are 10-15 minutes long for elementary school and 15 to 25 minutes long for middle school.”

Here are three ways to blend this software into your classwork:

Schedule author talks to coincide with relevant units in your language arts curriculum.
Use the author’s books as part of your reading assignments before the virtual visit.
Develop writing prompts inspired by the author’s work or writing style.

For example, a 5th-grade teacher at Edgewood ISD incorporated a virtual talk with a historical fiction author into their American Revolution unit. Students read one of the author’s books set in that era, then had the chance to ask the author about their research process and character development.

2. Foster A Range of Perspectives Through Author Selection

“By featuring authors from diverse backgrounds, we can ensure that students see themselves in the stories they read. This can foster a deeper connection and understanding of literary works.” Virtual platforms like BookBreak prioritize a wide range of voices and experiences:

Choose authors from various cultural backgrounds to reflect your student population.
Balance male and female authors throughout the year.
Include authors who write about diverse topics and themes.

A middle school English teacher at Edgewood ISD reported increased engagement from her students. This happened when they had the opportunity to interact with authors who shared their cultural backgrounds. “Seeing themselves represented in successful authors really motivated my students to pursue their own writing,” she noted.

Screenshot by author of Scholastic's Storyvoice website — Screenshot by author of **Scholastic’s Storyvoice website**

3. Use Pre- and Post-Talk Activities to Deepen Learning

Maximize the impact of virtual author talks by framing them with thoughtful activities:

Before the talk: Have students research the author and prepare questions. They can read excerpts or summaries of the book as well as other works to gain deeper insight. Character analysis can also be an important component.
During the talk: Guide students in taking notes on the author’s insights and advice. Handwritten notes, concept maps, graphic organizers can scaffold student thinking.
After the talk: Facilitate a class discussion about what they learned and how it applies to their own reading and writing.

Example: An elementary school librarian at Edgewood ISD created a “Meet the Author” bulletin board where students posted their favorite quotes and lessons from each virtual talk, creating a visual reminder of their literary connections.

Consider giving students a reverse outline or advance organizer that they can add to throughout the virtual talk. Some other ideas include:

Read aloud, then get feedback from others (Repeated Reading)
Discuss with others (Classroom Discussion, Reciprocal Teaching, Jigsaw Method)
Clarify vocabulary and meaning (Vocabulary Programs)
Jot down important ideas and information (Outlining, Summarization, Concept Mapping)
Annotate your text, write in the margins (Underlining and Highlighting)
Interrogate text (ask questions and make a quiz for Retrieval Practice)

Screenshot by author of Jefferson County Library District website — Screenshot by author of **Jefferson County Library District website**

4. Leverage Recording Features for Flexible Learning

“We’ve found that the recorded author talks on platforms…are just as valuable as the live events. They allow our teachers to revisit the content with their students, pause and rewind when needed, and even share with students who may have missed the live event. It’s been a game-changer for our district’s literacy initiatives,” says Brad CLoud, Director of Instructional Technology, Edgewood ISD. Virtual author talk platforms often offer recordings of their sessions. This makes it possible to do the following:

Use recorded talks as part of lesson plans.
Assign specific talks for independent work. This gives students time to engage with the content at their own pace.
Create a tailored list of author talks students can listen to for inspiration and research.

“Being able to view the author visits after the fact is crucial, as ALL teachers are busy and can’t always catch a visit in real time,” one user mentioned.

5. Extend the Impact Beyond the Classroom

One big benefit of virtual author talks? They facilitate collaboration between teachers and campuses. Consider these points:

Foster collaboration with other teachers to create cross-curricular projects.
Share highlights from the talks in school publications that engage parents with their children as they read.
Create displays featuring books by visiting virtual authors.

Some libraries may find that virtual book talks enhance their role as a collaborative learning space. These often enable them to set up author-themed reading corners. Those have the potential to become popular spots for students.

Leverage Virtual Author Talks to Boost Literacy

Use virtual author talks to enhance student literacy, engage interest, and encourage young readers. You may end up changing the reading statistics for the next generation with the power of author voices.

Supplemental Resources

Below you will find an AI-generated guided activities table, as well a curated list of virtual author talk platforms.

Guided Activities Table

Activity Name	Description	Teacher’s Role	Student Engagement	Learning Outcome
Author Bio Scavenger Hunt	Students research the visiting author and create a visual biography	Provide research guidelines and resources	Collaborative research and creative presentation	Improved research skills and author familiarity
Question Craft Workshop	Students learn to formulate thoughtful questions for the author	Guide students in developing open-ended questions	Peer review of questions	Enhanced critical thinking and inquiry skills
Virtual Book Club	Students read and discuss the author’s book prior to the talk	Facilitate discussions and provide reading prompts	Active participation in book discussions	Deeper comprehension and analysis of literature
Writing in the Author’s Style	Students create short pieces mimicking the author’s writing style	Analyze the author’s style with the class and provide writing prompts	Creative writing and peer feedback	Improved writing skills and style analysis
Post-Talk Reflection Journal	Students write about their takeaways from the author talk	Provide reflection prompts and feedback	Personal reflection and connection to their own reading/writing	Self-awareness of reading preferences and writing goals

Generated with Perplexity.AI

Virtual Author Talk Platforms

Title with Embedded URL to Website	Description	Pricing	Use Scenario
BookBreak	A platform that brings 2-4 bestselling authors to schools each month via live stream, catering to specific grade cohorts. It aims to ignite enthusiasm for reading and writing by providing comprehensive planning resources and ensuring diversity in featured authors.	Not explicitly stated, but offers free access to high-poverty schools when other schools join the program.	Ideal for schools looking to integrate author talks into their curriculum, especially those seeking to enhance literacy and engagement among students.
Las Vegas-Clark County Library District Virtual Author Talks	Offers free virtual author talks with critically-acclaimed writers, available for viewing from home. Past talks are archived for later access.	Free	Suitable for public libraries and individuals interested in attending virtual author talks from the comfort of their homes.
Storyvoice	Features live read-alouds by award-winning children’s authors and illustrators. The platform allows for interactive sessions and is accessible via share-screen or individual devices.	Not explicitly stated, but implies free access.	Ideal for classrooms and families looking for interactive live reading sessions with popular children’s authors.
Library Speakers Consortium	Provides live online author talks in partnership with the Library Speakers Consortium, featuring multiple bestselling authors each month.	Not explicitly stated.	Suitable for libraries and educational institutions seeking to connect with a variety of authors through live online events.
Authors Who Skype Free	A list of authors who connect virtually and in person	Varies by author	Ideal for educators hoping to connect with specific authors listed.

But wait, there’s one more FREE option!

Although not a virtual author talk source, Bookshare.org provides easy-to-read audiobooks and ebooks for readers, no matter what their ability. Get this…Bookshare is 100% free through an aware from the Office of Special Education Programs!

You can see a sample of their book selection via their website. What’s more, you can find a collection of human-narrated books (also, read TCEA’s blog entry on AI narrated books):

Bookshare has thousands of human-narrated audiobooks. You can listen to them in either MP3 or DAISY Audio formats on a variety of devices. Browse reading lists of their texts:

See how to qualify and complete membership in the United States.

August 8, 2024 0 comment

Artificial Intelligence Science

Help Save Coral Reefs by Joining the Calling in Our Corals Project

by Lori Gracey June 12, 2024

written by Lori Gracey

While there are lots of places on the earth that are too loud, the ocean isn’t one we normally think of. But a healthy coral reef is teeming with sound. “On the reef, you’ve got thousands of species of fish that are producing pops and chirps and croaks as they communicate with each other,” explains Steve Simpson, a professor at the University of Bristol.

However, in many parts of the world, the ocean is going silent. And that’s a problem because it means the coral reefs are dying. So scientists have created the Calling in Our Corals project, and you and your students can help.

Using AI to Listen

Marine biologists have dropped listening devices near coral reefs around the world and are recording the sounds there. But there are too many hours of audio for them to process. So they are asking for us to help by listening to short snippets, marking when we hear a sound. Then Artificial Intelligence in a tool called SurfPerch will analyze just those parts where sounds are heard.

coral reef

How You Can Help the Coral Reefs

Visit the website and go through a very brief tutorial on the sounds that you can expect to hear. It could be shrimp popping, whales singing, or fish “talking.” Once you’re trained, you can then select the area of the world you want to listen to and start contributing to the research.

This is a great project for students of all ages. Listening closely is a skill that we all need to practice. And being able to say that you’ve helped an important research study offers huge benefits in terms of self satisfaction and confidence.

June 12, 2024 0 comment

Social-Emotional Learning

Eight Tips for Practicing Active Listening in the Classroom

by Diana Benner October 29, 2021

written by Diana Benner

Active listening skills are necessary for developing an empathetic classroom. As mentioned in the Six Strategies for Building Empathy in the Classroom, we must make our students feel heard and express an active interest in what they are saying and feeling. As teachers, we do a lot of talking, but we must also invest time in listening. It is imperative to the health of our classroom community that we have excellent active listening skills. So let’s take a look at some information on active listening and go over some tips for practicing it in the classroom.

What Is Active Listening?

Active listening means, as its name suggests, actively listening. When actively listening, you are fully concentrating on what is being said and not thinking about what you will say next. It means listening with a genuine desire to understand the speaker’s feelings and perspective without placing judgment. In addition, active listening involves listening with all your senses. Interest can be conveyed to the speaker by using both verbal and nonverbal cues, like nodding your head or agreeing by saying “yes” to encourage them to continue speaking. By providing these cues, the person speaking will usually feel more at ease and communicate more easily and openly.

What Are the Benefits of Active Listening?

There are many benefits of active listening, including:

Better teacher-student relationships
Reduced tension and hostility in the classroom
Improved communication and trust among students and teachers
Positive classroom atmosphere and safe environment

In this article by the Harvard Graduate School of Education, active listening is also described as a sign of respect for what students bring to the table. It can be a way of showing them what they are capable of and modeling the importance of listening to each other. Waterford.org presents the benefits of active listening in the areas of communication skills, social-emotional development, and student confidence. Students are better able to communicate ideas and feelings since they have heard others do so. Those who develop active listening skills are less likely to feel frustrated and more likely to feel prepared and confident in their abilities. And active listening promotes mindful thinking, which can reduce anxiety and depression.

Tips for Active Listening

If you can, find a quiet place where you can talk with a student without interruption or distraction. Ask the student to share what’s on their mind. As they do so, try to incorporate the tips below.

Paraphrase

Once the student has finished expressing a thought, paraphrase what they said to make sure you understand and to show that you are paying attention. Things you can say are “What I hear you saying is…,” “It sounds like…,” or “If I understand you right….”

Ask questions

When appropriate, ask questions to encourage the student to elaborate on their thoughts and feelings. Try to avoid jumping to conclusions about what is being said. Instead, ask questions such as, “When you say_____, do you mean_____?” to clarify their meaning.

Use body language

As the listener, show that you are engaged and interested by nodding, facing the other person, and maintaining an open and relaxed body posture. Try to avoid attending to distractions in your environment or checking your phone. In addition, be mindful of your facial expressions. Avoid expressions that might convey disapproval.

Show empathy

If the student voices negative feelings, try to validate them rather than question them. Try to consider why they feel this way and put yourself in their shoes. You could say, “I can understand how that situation could cause frustration.”

Avoid judgement

Your goal is to understand your student’s perspective. Try not to interrupt with your own opinions while the student is speaking. Getting emotionally involved, angry, or upset is something you don’t want to do. You are a role model, and students are looking up to you.

Avoid giving advice too quickly

Allow the student to finish speaking before attempting to give advice. You want to make sure that you fully understand them first. Moving too quickly into advice-giving can be counterproductive.

Evaluate

After you have fully interpreted what the student has said, take a moment to evaluate the conversation.

Know that just listening is sometimes enough

Sometimes our students just want someone to listen to them. As teachers, we tend to want to “fix” our students’ problems for them. But if our minds are busy coming up with solutions for them, we fail to truly listen.

Active listening takes thought, practice, and a desire to put your student’s feelings above your own. Using active listening skills can make a meaningful difference in a student’s life. To learn more ways to practice empathy, as well as get tips, tools, and ideas for integrating it into your classroom, join us for our upcoming Lunch and Learn on November 3, 2021. The webinar is free to all members and will be recorded if you can’t attend the live event. In addition, don’t forget about our self-paced Social-Emotional Learning online course. This $29 course offers more ways to build upon social and emotional practices in your classroom and comes with a free TCEA membership!

October 29, 2021 1 comment

Educational Research Good Teaching

Who’s Doing the Talking in Our Classrooms?

by Lori Gracey February 16, 2021

written by Lori Gracey

As you may know, I am a HUGE John Hattie fan. His research has completely changed and enhanced my philosophy about how students (and adults) learn. So when I had the chance to hear him speak at our recent convention, I was thrilled. And his keynote did not disappoint as he shared great insights into the different types of learning, the jigsaw method, and more.

But I was saddened to hear part of his speech about the research on what is happening in classrooms right now with regard to talking.

How Fast We’re Talking

Hattie stated that, in primary schools, kids talk about about 124 words per minute. Secondary students talk at a rate of approximately 140 words per minute. Teachers, however, across all grade levels, are incredibly fast talkers who speak at 174 words per minute, which is too fast for many students to comprehend. And teachers also tend to speak at 1.5 to two grades above the grade level they are teaching.

Let’s just think about that for a minute. We are speaking too fast for kids to comprehend and we are speaking above what they could understand even if we slowed down. So there is an obvious need to reduce the speed at which we talk and carefully consider our vocabulary as we are teaching.

Are You Listening?

But beyond the speed and vocabulary level at which we speak, there is also the question of who is doing the most talking in our classrooms. I think we can all agree that it should be the students. They should be asking questions, talking with each other, problem solving out loud. But the research is clear.

89% of the talking that occurs in our classrooms is done by the teacher, not the students.
Teachers ask, on average, 142 questions a day to the students, almost all of which require three-word responses or less.
Students ask, on average, 11 total questions a day, of which nine are procedural. (What page are we on? Can I go to the bathroom? Will there be a test on this?)
More than 90% of the questions that teachers ask each day of the students are surface learning questions. The statistic is the same for the percent of questions that are asked on tests.

So what are the chances that students will be able to effectively learn if we are doing all of the talking and they are only listening? What are the chances that students will be able to master complex ideas if they rarely engage in content-related or deep-thinking questions? How likely is it that they will develop appropriate speech patterns and vocabulary if they are only listening and not speaking? How can we know our students if we are only listening to them 11% of the time?

What’s the Solution?

I can remember when I was learning to be a teacher that I was encouraged to use the 10-second wait time strategy. That meant that, after asking a question, I would wait 10 seconds before calling on a student to respond or before I gave the answer. While I think that strategy may still have some merit at certain times, I think more drastic measures are required. The simplest solution is for us as teachers to quit talking.

talking

There’s an old saying that there’s a reason why humans have one mouth and two ears. We should be listening twice as much as we are speaking. I think we all need to try to listen more starting right now. To listen to our students, to listen to our colleagues, to listen to our family and friends — this is what I challenge you to do beginning today.

Update

Dennis Schug shared these ideas on this subject after reading the blog. What do you think?

What if we: Focused on asking/inviting better questions? Developed a bank of facilitator protocols? Used “wait time” to create space? Co-constructed a culture celebrating #stuvoice?

February 16, 2021 5 comments

Leadership

A Challenge to Leaders to Listen

by Dr. Bruce Ellis February 19, 2018

written by Dr. Bruce Ellis

The other day, I was talking with my wife. She had just come home from work and was sharing a frustration of her day. Before she was able to complete two sentences, I was ready to provide a solution that only included three easy steps. As I interrupted with what I thought was going to be received as a caring gesture, she looked at me and said “I’m not looking for a solution. I know what to do. I just needed someone that I can share my frustration with.” Ouch! While I didn’t gain any Husband of the Year votes from that encounter, it did get me to thinking about how many times I assume everyone is needing a solution when they talk with me…or at least before they get two sentences out.

As a leader at work we have a lot of people that share information with us. Some sharing is just to inform us, while other sharing may have a bigger need behind it. That bigger need could be “I need feedback,” “I need to hear myself think aloud with someone so I can decide the best solution,” or even “I need you to recommend a solution.” Sometimes I have asked at the beginning of a conversation, “How do I need to listen?” if it isn’t obvious or if I’m not sure. By interrupting with my solution, I have found that I break a connection and reduce their likelihood to share with me – neither of which I want to do.

The Seven Habits Include Listening

In his book The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People, Stephen Covey had it correct when he said, “Most people do not listen with the intent to understand; they listen with the intent to reply.” That is so true. Even when I don’t blurt out a solution, it is likely that the voice in my head is formulating a solution even as the other person is sharing. Doing this robs me of being in the moment and hearing, I mean really hearing what is being communicated. As a leader, when we do really listen, we might be amazed at the insight of the one sharing, touched by their transparency, or even inspired by their perception or thought process. These are definitely traits I want my staff to emulate and share. In response, I find that I reciprocate by esteeming, having more respect for, and even wanting to know more of what they are thinking.

How Best to Listen

My challenge to you as a leader is to hold off on blurting out a solution so you can move on to the next problem that needs solving or the next item on your to-do list. Instead, take time to be in the moment and really listen to what is being said. Just like teachers give wait time after asking a question, give yourself wait time to hear what is being said. If you need more concrete steps, consider the following:

Keep your mind from wandering – Learn to stay focused on what the other person is saying. Don’t let your mind wander to other tasks you have waiting or what you might rather be doing.
Practice mirroring the speaker – Body language can go a long way in letting someone know that we are not only listening to what they are saying, but are interested in what they say. For more information, consider reading Todd A. Fonseca’s post The Power of Mirroring.
Summarize – Summarize back to the person what you think you heard. Sometimes it is easy to miss an important part or overlook something that the speaker was trying to emphasize. And doing this also tells the speaker that you value them enough to pay great attention to their words.
Ask open-ended questions – If you need clarification or more information, ask open-ended questions. This will encourage the speaker to elaborate and fill in those missing details while also letting them feel acknowledged and listened to.

I challenge each of you for two weeks to really focus on listening – whether at work, home, or play. Let me know how it goes. I’d love to have a conversation with you; you can email me at bellis@tcea.org or post your comment below. Either way, you’ve got my ear.

February 19, 2018 0 comment