Reading Lickety-Split (Thanks Susie Gross!)

As the school year winds down, I had to decide if I wanted to try and do more stories with my classes or read a second book for the year. I decided to do a second book after seeing the recent moreTPRS posts from Susie about reading lickety-split (reading quickly for meaning and not necessarily for increase vocabulary, testing, etc). Susie's idea was so freeing that I decided to try it. I have to say that my previous experiences with reading have been good, but not great. It takes sooooo long and some kids get the new vocabulary through the repetition, but I ended up losing quite a few students who were pretending to play the game while secretly daydreaming. I was so mad at myself after reading Pirates first semester because I actually had a couple of students who regressed in their French instead of growing. I thought, "What was this Krashen guy thinking??" Okay, I really didn't think that because, since meeting him this summer, I think the guy is an amazing genius fighter for public education and the poor. But I was very confused and sad. Flash forward to today. We've been reading Pauvre Anne with my 1s and Fama with my 2s. We read it super fast. Sometimes we read/translate it chorally, sometimes I ask for volunteers to read/translate an individual sentence, and sometimes they read a paragraph with a partner. We are over halfway done and we just started. Another thing that I have tried this time (thanks to Carol Gaab for the idea) is having a secret word for each chapter or section. I skim the section and find a word that comes up quite a few times. The students are supposed to yell that word whenever it comes up that day. Keeps kids engaged and keeps the less-than-engaged kids from falling asleep. Is it working? Well, we are having great discussions about racism in my 2 classes and the 1 classes are talking about lower-level things like family and dancing. IN FRENCH. I have asked my classes if they prefer this book or Pirates, and I've gotten mixed results. Amazing considering that my 1s from last year still talk about burning Pauvre Anne...I'm not getting that kind of hate this year at all. But here's the magic part...I have some students who have struggled all year, and they are BLOSSOMING with this book. They are raising their hands and sticking their necks out to try to read a sentence for the class! They are learning! And, if I needed further proof that Krashen is a genius, I only need to look at their latest writing samples. IT IS TRUE THAT READING INCREASES ACCURACY IN WRITING!! (for most students) I'm so happy with my results...I might even brag and post this to moreTPRS...