How to Give Students Better Book Recommendations: Part 4

How to give students better book recommendations

Hi, friend, and thanks for making it all the way to part 4 in this monthly series all about how to get better at recommending books! I’m hoping you loved all of the previous posts and that’s why you’re here, but if you missed those, you’ll want to backtrack to the previous parts because they’re full of fabulous book rec tips! This final post builds on everything I’ve already mentioned and explained, so please check out the first 3 posts before heading back here:

Ready? Let’s get started with 5 final tips to help you help your readers when they inevitably ask, “What should I read next?”

1. Check out library and book store displays to learn about new books and authors.

If you want to get better at recommending books, you need to surround yourself with books and see what others are reading and recommending. One way to do this is to frequent libraries and bookstores. This might be bad for your wallet, but good for your book rec skills, so browse carefully (or just stick to the library). Honestly, libraries are my favorite place to do this! I’m a sucker for the front-facing displays, the librarian reviews, and all the little pamphlets/resources hanging around the teen section. Libraries are fabulous resources, and so are librarians. Like I mentioned in my first post, don’t be afraid to befriend a librarian…you’ll never run out of book recs.

Check library and bookstore displays to learn about new books and author.s
Check library and bookstore displays to learn about new books and authors.

2. Host book lotteries to see which books generate the most buzz.

Like I mentioned in my first post, I often hold “book lotteries” for Book Trailer Tuesday and First Chapter Friday titles, but I also like to do this with other books I mention or book talk in class. I especially enjoy doing this with brand new books. For students, it’s extra exciting to be the very first reader of a brand new book. For me, I like seeing which books catch on immediately, which books totally flop, and which books might need a little bit more talking and advertising before they start trending. Again, like I mentioned in part 1, you can ask your first readers to be “product testers” who give you their honest thoughts on the text and help you know if it’s worth a read or recommendation!

3. Develop a system for recommending books.

You can be the best at recommending books but still feel overwhelmed when multiple students swarm you asking, “What should I read next?” If you want to level up your book recommendations, brainstorm a system that will keep the recs coming on autopilot. If you’re struggling to visualize what this might look like in your classroom, here are a few different things I do. I make sure my students are ALWAYS surrounded by book recs and systems to find new books: 

  • Book Recommendation Brochures: These book recommendation brochures for middle and high school are designed to help students answer the question of “What should I read next?” Through interactive reader personality quizzes, these brochures automatically suggest personalized book recommendations to your students. It’s a magical, self-sustaining system that will get good books into the hands of your readers! Click HERE to learn about the brochures, HERE for ideas on using them, HERE to find the middle school set, or HERE to check out the high school version.
  • Visual Book Recommendation Posters: Help your middle & high school readers find their next favorite book with visual book recommendation posters. Organized by topics like sports, survival stories, mental health, what to read if you don’t like to read, and MORE, these posters make it easy for your readers to find the perfect book. Click HERE to read more about the posters. You can check out the middle school version HERE and the high school poster set HERE.
Develop a system for recommending books.
Develop a system for recommending books on autopilot.

4. Track which books are the most popular. (If you use Booksource, this is easy).

To become a master book recommender, you need to know which books are the most popular among your students! While you probably already know the top few titles, it’s even better to look at data detailing the most checked-out books in your classroom library (and the least, too).

If you use Booksource, you can find this data by logging into your teacher dashboard and opening up your “Library.” From there, go to the filter icon (to the right of the search) and filter your view to “Popularity” in “Descending” order. This will show you the most popular books and how many times they’ve been checked out. 

If you don’t use Booksource, another way you can easily see which books are trending is by taking a weekly picture of the stack of returned books. Save them to an album on your phone, and you’ll have a nice visual record of all checkouts. I actually like to post these pics on my Instagram for a fun visual, even though I have all of my Booksource data.

5. Listen to bookish podcasts like “Hey YA” for even more book recs.

My final tip is one I am just now beginning to explore. As I was writing this post, it occurred to me that book recommendations are everywhere…you just have to look. I love books, and I love podcasts, so I opened up my podcast app to search for book podcasts. Lo and behold, THEY EXIST. Not sure why it took me so long to discover this, but after a few listens, I can confirm they are pretty cool for staying up to date on middle grade and YA lit so you can recommend books students will love. Here are a few shows I’ve followed. 

Listen to bookish podcasts like "Hey YA" for even more book recs.
Listen to bookish podcasts like “Hey YA” for even more book recs.

I HOPE YOU ENJOYED THIS 4-PART SERIES ON RECOMMENDING BOOKS YOUR READERS WILL LOVE!

This is the final post in my month-long series on recommending books to your readers, but there’s a lot more where this came from! Keep reading for more resources, tips, and blog posts to help you build a community of readers in your classroom.

LOVE THESE IDEAS, BUT WANT GOOD BOOK RECS RIGHT NOW?

Lucky for you, I’ve worked hard to curate lists, systems, and resources full of book recommendations for middle and high school readers. 

  • Free Book Trailer Tuesday Links for the Entire Year: Want to recommend books and hook your students on reading in less than 3 minutes a week? Try Book Trailer Tuesday! I’ve made it easy to start with a FREE list of book trailer links (for middle and high school). You can find that free resource HERE.
  • Free Middle & High School Book Recs Facebook Group: Join our free community for book recommendations for grades 6-12 readers HERE.
  • Book Recommendation Brochures: These book brochures are designed to help students answer the question of “What should I read next?” Through interactive reader personality quizzes, these brochures automatically suggest personalized book recommendations to your students. It’s a magical, self-sustaining system that will get good books into the hands of your readers! Click HERE to learn about the brochures, HERE for ideas on using them, HERE to find the middle school set, or HERE to check out the high school version.
  • Visual Book Recommendation Posters: Help your middle school readers find their next favorite book with visual book recommendation posters. Organized by topics like sports, survival stories, mental health, what to read if you don’t like to read, and MORE, these posters make it easy for your readers to find the perfect book. Click HERE to read more about the posters. You can check out the middle school version HERE and the high school poster set HERE.

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