I came across the fact that students do not read the short stories or novels told by the teacher. So I was trying to find a way not to leave reading activities aside during lessons. Suddenly, watching one of my students, I realized: Why not downloading the books they want to read into their cellphones or laptops?!We may come to an agreement based on what kind of novel we want them to read and then they can download the story into their cellphones. The idea is that they are able to read it whenever they want to, even when they are travelling to school by bus or before going to bed, just to mention some examples.
I know that you will probably say that they could do it with the printed version anyway, but if we want to engage our students in reading, why not doing so with a device they use everyday?
So I started to look for some reliable websites and I found these:
Obooko, every book you see is free
Goodreads
The books are separated by categories: Romance, Thriller, Young, Teens, Arts, etc. You can see the cover of the book and its review.
In both websites you have to log in, but you can do it but using your Facebook account. In Obooko, all books are free whereas in Goodreads all of them are free but within a period of time (with the exception of the old ones, which have no cost).
I think it is a good and an interesting way of engaging our students. I actually proposed this to a teenager and even though she did not like the reading part that much, she liked the fact that it would be by using her cellphone.
