Weeks 12-13: Book Promotion- Kentucky Derby Book Race

Now that my Portfolio is done and submitted two weeks ago, I wanted to find a project to earn the remainder of my outside hours. I searched on Pinterest and found a March Madness book bracket project. Since March Madness had obviously passed for this year, I took the idea to my cooperating supervisor. She suggested to create a Kentucky Derby Book Race!

The premise of this reading promotion activity is to allow students to vote for their favorite book from a list of "horses" on which these books would be jockeys. The cooperating supervisor and I chose a list from the top circulated titles in the collection. Popular titles such as Diary of a Wimpy Kid, Harry Potter, The Hunger Games, Divergent, and Maximum Ride were chosen. Students were allowed to vote an unlimited number of times up until May 2, the last day of school before the actual Derby. As votes were counted, the horses would "race" towards the finish line. At the end of the two weeks of voting, a drawing would be done of the winning books' votes. The winner would receive their own copy of the winning book!

Creating the bulletin board took many hours. I covered the bulletin board in green rather than brown of the track. My school did not have a horse die-cut shape, so I drove to Gheen's Academy in Louisville. Gheen's is the teacher resource facility for JCPS and is available to any teacher in the area. I cut the horses out using their machine. I drove back to Bullitt County, printed out 15 book covers, and glued them to the horses. I die-cut the letters for the bulletin board title, as well as the track fence. I created the voting tally sheet and the vote box.  Finally, I had my mom help me create my very own model of the twin spires! It was a time-consuming, but fun, process.

Students were alerted to this reading promotion activity by the bulletin board and every morning announcement for two weeks. I tried my best to tally the votes and move the horses towards the finish line every day, but often it was every 2-3 days. I kept the morning TV crew apprised of the winners thus far. For a long time, The Hunger Games was clearly outvoting every single other book. But in a surprise finish, Divergent beat HG by 100 votes!

This reading promotion activity was a clear success. Over 500 votes were counted. All language arts teachers and the library media center were given ballots every day. Many students were involved in voting for their favorite book! Finally, two students were selected from the Divergent books and received a prize! It was such a fun experience that I hope to continue in my positions a