Folsom
School Summer Reading Program
The Reaction Journal – Directions
You are expected to keep a journal on your summer reading
of these books. This journal will be reviewed by your Reading teacher in
September and may be part of the grade you receive for this project.
- Use a steno pad, a notebook, or binder in which you
can easily arrange your journal entries for your teacher. Reaction journals
may also be typed.
- Make sure your writing is clear and grammatical. Write
in full sentences and paragraphs, and identify which section or chapter of
the book you are referring to.
- Have from ten to fifteen journal entries for the book
you read. There does not need to be one per chapter.
- Write a complete bibliographic citation for the book
you have read: author, title, place of publication, publisher, and date of
publication.
- A typical journal entry may be a page or several
paragraphs. It is not important how much you say, but how well you say it.
Remember that you are sharing your thoughts about a book with the teacher.
Do not include a plot summary of the book!
- Date
each journal entry that you write.
- Your Reading teacher will collect the journal during
the first full week of school in September. Do not wait until late in the
summer to begin this project.
Reaction Journals
As you read, write your personal
responses to the work. State your feelings, thoughts, reaction, and questions
about situations, ideas, action characters, settings, symbols, plot, theme, and
any other elements of the work that interest you or mean something to you.
You cannot be wrong in your
responses, so take risks and be honest. Write about what you like or dislike,
what seems confusing or unusual to you. Tell what you think something means.
Look for examples of writing you particularly like or dislike and write about
them. Make predictions about what might happen later. Relate your personal
experiences that connect with the plot, characters, or setting.
If you like, quote brief passages from the work and respond
to them. Try to relate this work to another work you’ve read. How are they
alike? How are they different?
Avoid plot summary. Simply
read, think, and write your thoughts.
The following is a list of suggested sentence lead ins.
- I wonder what this means…
- I really don’t understand this part because…
- I really like/dislike this idea because…
- This character reminds me of somebody I know
because…
- This character reminds me of myself because…
- The character I most admire is (name of character)
because…
- I think this setting is important because…
- This scene reminds me of a similar scene in (title of
work) because…
- This part is very realistic/unrealistic because…
- I like/dislike this writing because…
- This section makes me think about___ because…
- This section is particularly effective because…
- I think the relationship between ___ and ____ is
interesting because…
- The ideas here remind me of the ideas in (title of
work) because…
- I like/dislike (name of character) because…
- This situation reminds me of a similar situation in my
own life. It happened when…
- If I were (name of character) at this point, I
would…
