How to Host a Book Tasting Event
My district has been offering book tasting for many years. It’s been a wonderful program to introduce students to new book genres by getting books into their hands and giving them a chance to explore. It’s also a good exercise in choosing a book that’s the right fit for you. This is not an original idea by any means but I wanted to share how we did it in case it’s something you’re interested in doing in your school or your classroom.
I’m a French Immersion teacher so the books pictured are in French but our English teachers get this opportunity as well. The images are just here to show how we set it up in my classroom.
*As this was put on by my district, I do not have a master list of the books, sorry. Luckily it doesn’t need to be specific books. You can choose any genres and any books within that genre that appeal to the reading level and interest of your students.
Time required: 1-1.5 hours. We did it between recess and lunch and used most of the time
Book selection & genres
Since ours is a district program, they have all these books in totes. If you’re wanting to run something like this, you could go choose 8-12 books per genre from your library. Ask your librarian for help in selecting books at your grade level.
For genres, we had: Indigenous authors, picture books, science, comics/graphic novels, SEL, and biographies.
You could also do things like fantasy, mystery, historical, animals…anything you want. The type of book will depend on the level of your students.
Set up
Since this activity takes quite some time and so does the set up, I suggest doing it right after a transition time, so first thing in the morning, after recess or after lunch. That way you can set up while the students are not in the classroom and can start right away when they enter. We had six stations. At each station we put a table cloth, a little plant and the genre card. Then we placed chairs around.
On each table we put pencils and book tasting menus (one per student).
For ambiance we turned the lights down low and played French café music.
How it works
Divide students into as many groups as you have genres and have them sit at a table.
Before starting, go over your expectations for the activity and treatment of the books. I go over the menu and we ensure everyone knows where to find title and the author.
Explain that they will have 5 minutes to minutes to look at the books at their table. They can check out as many books at they wish. This should be independent, though they often want to show their friends cool things they see in the books. Whispering is ok, but it should be a calm, quiet environment. In the times I’ve done book tastings, I’ve always been impressed with how well my classes have gotten into the spirit of the activity and have kept their voices low and have focused on the activity.
After 5 minutes you will give them a signal that it’s time for them to fill out their menu (free download below). I give them a few minutes for this. They need to choose one of the books they looked at/read, it doesn’t have to be their favourite. We had them fill out the title, author name, give a rating and tell us if they’d like to have that book in their class. We got to order two of the books but if you’re using library books, maybe you sign it out as a read aloud or add it to your class wish list to buy when you get money for books.
Once the menu time is up, they will get up, push in their chairs and go rotate to the next table.
Repeat until each group has gone to every table.