Parallel Novels

I got this question from Chris Minkoff:

Hi Ben,

I’ve been following the blog and enjoying immensely. I’ve come across one item recently that has really gotten my attention, namely parallel novels. I see the last post being December of 2011, but I hope to start running my Spanish 3 students on parallel novels. I have three periods of Spanish 3, so 3 different novels with all those reps would be incredible.

Are you still doing parallel novels? How did it go doing those, and creating N2’s last year? Any reflections or silver bullets would be appreciated.

Thanks!

Chris

My response is that (in my own experience) PN is great in character development but boring in plot, just like the novels are boring. So I never can get the plots cranked up. That’s the short answer.

I am working really hard on basic novel teaching now with my kids anyway. Reading was the weakest area for my kids last year on the DPS assessment. Part of that is that 60% of them don’t have command of English since they are not documented, which results in a fracturing of the translation work. But I want to learn how to teach a novel this year for real. Teaching Step 3 readings of stories I’m ok with but I need the novel training. Believe it or not, jen’s GR, intended for discussion and not originally for reading classes, is helping me in the area of reading. Whoever wants to extend a thread on this is welcome. But Parallel Novels, it’s like Reader’s Theatre, something Jason can do but few others, certainly not me.