Last year, the English department (consisting of myself and the Korean English teacher) conducted an English speaking contest. Up to twice a day, students can stop by the English classroom, participate in a two-minute English conversation with yours truly, and collect stickers. The students with the most stickers of their grade got prizes. It was a simple challenge that I adored because it was a small but meaningful opportunity to get to know my students. On top of that, I got to make revelatory assessments on my students’ relationship and proficiency with English.
However, as if they found a brilliant loophole, my middle schoolers gravitated towards reading to earn their stickers when I told them it was an option. Instead of disappointed, I was sympathetic. I understand the challenge of spontaneous conversation in a second language. I have to deal with it every day as a foreigner in Korea.
So I’d attentively listen to their reading, keeping note of challenging vocabulary and unfamiliar sentence structures. But bigger questions were floating through my mind. I wondered what attracted the students to certain books. Was it the cover? Did it look funny, enjoyable, interesting? Or did they not think about it at all and just picked randomly?
At the end of the contest, I took a deeper look at the bookshelf. It was really a random assortment of English books that were connected to general ESL pedagogy, but probably didn’t mean much to my students. In preparation for my second year as a Native English teacher, I wanted to change that perspective and get the students to strategically engage with these books. There was a reason we had them in the English classroom, after all.
I went ahead and got to it during Winter break. I surveyed and cataloged all the books in the classroom, labeling each by reading level and genre. With a clean slate, an organized bookshelf, and helpful visual guide, I hope this year my students will look at the books with determination and genuine interest, while still leaving room for spontaneity. I’ll detail how I built the library from concept to the final product.
the goals
I believe every teacher wants a nice-looking, organized, presentable classroom. I’m one of a few Native English teachers in the province privileged with one, so I wanted to feel that same sense of pride. While we invested in a brand new bookcase last year, it was apparent that the present books haven’t been surveyed possibly since their purchases.
No matter. I saw this as an opportunity to improve the look and vibes of the classroom from intimidating and unfamiliar to those without the strongest grasp on the English classroom to welcoming, and even a little fun.
Beyond the aesthetics, I have had a strong curiosity about how I could concretely define my students’ English levels. Anecdotally, they can be all over the place. This is due to the extra opportunities some Korean students have to attend private English hagwons after school for additional tutoring and exams. On the other hand, some unfortunately are not yet proficient in even the alphabet by the time they reach middle school.
My middle school is small, with about 30 students. I felt more than capable of individualizing the English learning experience. So I had two goals: Create a library that was organized to gauge student interest AND reading levels at the same time. The next step was just finding the right tools to do so.
cataloging
The bookshelf was a mix of books and board games, so the actual book count was obscured by the space being taken up by Halli Galli, Scrabble, and Settlers of Catan boxes. In my initial assessment I counted about 350 books, or over 10 per student. While it felt intimidating at first as someone who has never properly catalogued a library (aside from my modest home collection), I came to learn it was a smaller beast to tame than I thought.
Thankfully, there are robust tools around for small library projects just like mine. After some research, I opted to use Booksource’s classroom library tool, which was intuitive, feature-rich, and best of all, FREE.
The most relevant feature for me was the integrated ISBN scanner tool that could quickly update my digital catalog with accurate metadata and reading levels. I have to say it didn’t have a 100% success rate with books published in Korea. While the subsequent manual input was hardly a daunting task, I did have to seek other resources to get accurate reading levels.
There are a few ways books are leveled. I adopted Accelerated Reader over something like Lexical because of its simpler numerical system and the accompanying quizzes and assessments for each book. While scanning the books, I physically sorted them by AR level. If it didn’t come up on Booksource, I would usually have better luck finding it on arbookfind.com.
My initial shelf organization plan was to sort by AR level so students can know exactly how challenging each book is. But the funny thing about students is that they’ll take the path of least resistance every time. I foresaw level 0-1 copies being pulled off the shelves indiscriminately. That’s not where the joy of reading comes from.
I ultimately wanted to present the books in the way that they would pique the literature interests of my students, so while I scanned and sorted by AR level, I took note of the general genres of each book to point out broader categories to direct my forthcoming tasks.
I used white circle label stickers for the AR levels, and modified them to exclude the month of the level (so instead of a book being labeled “3.3”, it would just be 3). They were placed towards the top of the spine, as the bottom would have the genre labels. There are unique IDs in Booksource, but the size of the collection didn’t warrant that level of labeling on the books themselves in my opinion, especially once I learned that the collection included a limited number of genres.
genres
The range of genres wasn’t a hindrance to the breadth and depth of the collection itself, but it did force me to be strategic about how specific I wanted to get. My students have an affinity for Disney, so I considered that as a genre label. I was surprised to discover the quantity of science-related books, so I knew they definitely needed their own label. There were plenty of picture books, but also books with pictures. Which ones are supposed to be labelled as which?
These were just a few considerations during the genre organization stage of this library project. The flexibility of this part didn’t feel very comfortable at first. I initially consulted Good Reads for genre ideas, went with what genre came first, then eventually trusted my intuition enough to select the best one for the coveted book label.
The categories themselves are mostly generalized. We have fiction, nonfiction, picture, and children’s as the biggest genres. A very small handful of books include specific categories like dystopian fiction, biography, or humor. Introducing a little specificity felt like a net benefit to my students’ book discovery experience, so long as it didn’t feel overwhelming. A separate “Classics” genre was important as well, as the Korea education system features those prominently in English curriculum.
Once every book was comfortably re-sorted by genre, I worked on the design of the labels themselves.
Gratefully, there are teachers who have provided resources online for genre labels. Unfortunately, they had to be modified heavily for a classroom in Korea.
I adored Molly Malloy’s book spine labels she designed and sells on Teachers Pay Teachers. They’re colorful and stand out, and also came with a customizable genre poster to hang up next to the shelf. They’re simple enough to use; print them on this version of Avery label template and attach.
Except, Avery labels are not cheap to buy in Korea (some 40,000 Won on Coupang) and practically useless for organizations that print with primarily A4 paper. I had to reformat the labels for a size that was more accessible in this country and fit A4 paper.
Avery’s Australian site provides templates for the label size I opted to purchase. In a few extra steps, I reformatted Molly’s icons so I could print my labels with ease and reproducibility.
I stuck the genre labels prominently on the bottom of the spines for easy navigation. Ultimately, I want students to familiarize themselves with the types of stories the library offers, not just the English levels.
The end
In a matter of weeks, my ESL library project was finished… for now! According to the Booksource classroom library tool, there are definitely some improvements to be made.
While there are plenty of classics and familiar favorites, we don’t have any new books from the past 5 years. I think that’s okay as I believe it’s best to stick with the familiar when learning a new language.
Also, I’ll have to see what books get the most attention, anyway.
The beginning
I anticipate marketing the library to be a much more intensive task than creating it. Right now I’m strategizing on how to encourage students to check out the books on their own time and how to incorporate some literature into the curriculum. There are uses like shadowing and building vocabulary. I can definitely distribute rewards to students who check out books, either casually, or as an annual English challenge. A library whose books sit unused is about as useful as an unorganized one.
I will come back with any updates and evaluations on the library. Until then, I’m familiarizing myself with the collection by reading through it in my leisure time and reviewing them on Good Reads. There are definite gems in there (e.g. “Where the Wild Things Are”, Roald Dahl novels) that can open up a whole new realm of English learning. I’m displaying my favorites as I evaluate them. With school back in session, I know it will be difficult to get the students to go out of their way to explore a library not in their native language, so I hope I’ve made it at least visually inviting enough to get a glance. Wish me luck!
