Feedback Requested: Finalizing our 24-25 Book List

We'd love for teachers and librarians to help us select 25 MG and 25 YA titles to read, discuss, and celebrate in the year(s) ahead

Happy Sunday everyone,

The focus of this week’s update is simple — it’s time to finalize our 2024-25 Project LIT Book Club selections! Whether you’ve been been part of our community for years or you’re new to this newsletter, we’d love your participation. Specifically, we’re looking for all-star teachers, librarians, and book lovers (all of you) to help us narrow our list of 100+ outstanding MG (Middle Grade) and YA (Young Adult) titles to a more manageable number before we “reveal” our official list in early January. The plan is to add 25 MG and 25 YA titles to our existing collection.

First, some background on our community: My students and I founded the inaugural Project LIT “chapter” in the fall of 2016 (as part of a PBL unit) with the goal of eliminating book deserts and promoting a love of reading. We hosted our first community-wide book club in January 2017. Our first selection? The Crossover by Kwame Alexander. You can check out the highlights from year one here. By May of 2017, we encouraged other students and educators to join our movement and launch Project LIT chapters of their own. Our 2017-18 picks (books like The Hate U Give and Long Way Down) were selected by our Project LIT founders, but every year thereafter has been a group effort.

Generally, here’s how the selection process works: Project LIT students and educators around the country nominate MG and YA titles they’d like to see added to our collection. We take the nominations and develop an initial list of “contenders” — approximately 100 wonderful MG and YA titles. We then rely on feedback from Project LIT chapters, students and educators, to cut that list in half. After our Project LIT chapters submit their “ballots” and we finalize our list, we then announce, or “reveal,” each title on social media.

Please note that your chapter does not have to be “active” for you to participate in this process. (If you are reading this update, we’d love for you to be involved!) And if you’re looking to learn more about what it looks like to lead a Project LIT chapter, be sure to check out Chapter 8 of my book JUST READ IT: Unlocking the Magic of Independent Reading in Middle and High School Classrooms. Use the code HOLIDAY25 for 25% off + free shipping.

With that out of the way, here’s how you can get involved right now: check out this list of MG and YA titles — they are all in contention to be added to our Project LIT collection. Add them to your TBR (To Be Read) list, share and discuss with students, and then, when you’re ready, complete this form to help us narrow the 100+ titles down to a more manageable number. Additionally, if you have some free time this month, we’d love help with a few tasks. We will then send out the official "ballots” later this month before publicly “revealing” 25 MG titles and 25 YA titles in January 2025. creating a slideshow of our “contenders” and updating our “tracker.”

Thanks in advance for your participation. And again, do not worry if you haven’t been reading as much as you used to or don’t have an active Project LIT chapter — we’d still love for you to be involved. And please reach out if you or your students have any questions, ideas, suggestions, recommendations, etc. As always, happy reading!

Jarred

UPDATES & REMINDERS

1. I recently recorded a webinar that outlines my Read & WRAP framework and general approach to the ELA block. You can check it on Corwin’s YouTube channel here. (I’m excited to collaborate with many of y’all to develop a Read and WRAP sequence, among other things. Stay tuned for that invite!)

2. I was honored to join Natalie Daily, Stephanie Wilson, and Amy Hermon, the incredible host of the School Librarians United podcast. You can listen to our conversation here.

3. JUST READ IT is officially (or perhaps unofficially?) an Amazon Top New Release and Corwin bestseller. This book continues to find readers because of y’all. Thanks again to everyone who has purchased a copy, spread the word in your school/district, facilitated a book study, shouted out Just Read It on social media, shared a Goodreads review, or sent me a kind message or email. It means more than you know. You can order JUST READ IT on Amazon or here (use the code HOLIDAY25 for 25% + free shipping. Corwin has also shared an excerpt from the book; check out Chapter 1 here.

4. If your school, district, or organization is planning a JUST READ IT book study or would like for me to deliver a keynote address and/or lead a PD session/workshop in 2025 or 2026, please reach out. I love connecting with fellow educators and supporting/strengthening your team’s literacy efforts.