Big Kids Social Book Club

Before committing to joining, please note this club will only be meeting on Sundays (time TBD) for the time being! Please read through everything carefully before joining.

As of right now, clubs are scheduled to start back up in June 2023!

Book club is coming back soon….

I would like to make sure everyone knows what they are signing up for exactly. Some info on this page may be the same as the The Little Readers Club page, but not all of it is. So, Please read EVERYTHING carefully. After you have read through everything, the sign up form is below. If you have questions after reading try checking out the frequently asked questions page, though most question can be answered simply by reading the information below. If this club isn’t what you’re looking for you may want to check out The Little Readers Club (mostly enjoyed by ages 4-9, but all are welcome!)

If after reading the details you are still interested in joining, please fill out the below form. Once you have signed up you will receive an email with the book we’ll be reading at your first meeting, along with any other pertinent details.

Unlike The Little Readers Club, this club focuses on discussing chapter books that need to be read BEFORE the meetings, and furthering social skills through games and (upon request of some of the children already in the club), now we try to do a craft each week as well!

The meetings are two-parters. We’ll be talking about the book we read beforehand for the first half, and spending the second half socializing, and occasionally doing simple arts and crafts when time allows.

One book a week or month (depending on the length of the book) will be chosen and should be read BEFORE each meeting. Meetings are held weekly online, in a safe space environment via Zoom. The children (and parents if you’d like) will get to talk about the book chosen in a fun and educational way, following their lead as much as possible! We discuss things like what was learned from the chapter/book, what they think may happen in the next book (for those that are in a series), what they noticed in the way it was written and the wording, settings, themes, conflict and resolution, etc. Topics appropriate for the age. A few fun facts about the author here and there may be tossed in as well.

This is a book club so of course we’ll be discussing the book related topics as I said, however, (as stated above) it’s also a club for socialization. For the second half of both clubs I try my best to get the kids engaged in talking to one another so they can work on socialization skills with peers and maybe make some new friends. We may play a socialization game each week, not always the same game. The games are just to help children start talking, if it trails off to other things (it normally does) that’s great! I’ll move the discussion along, doing my best to follow the children’s lead, it’s their club after all.

But, before playing the socialization game (that’s a last resort option to get them talking), I always ask if anyone has a topic they’d like to discuss. It can be literally anything they’d like, as long as it’s appropriate of course. If they do we’ll see how far the discussion can go on that topic. If nobody has anything to spark a convo we’ll play one of the socialization games to get things going. I include the free discussion time because I know not everyone enjoys reading and often that’s one of the reasons parents sign up for this, to encourage reading more. The idea is, hopefully, if the children know reading the book means it will eventually lead to them getting to talk about things they actually do care about, it will encourage them to read. Maybe not everything all the time, but at least the book club books, which is a good start. The meetings may not be super fun for children if it’s just all book talk and books aren’t really their thing, but reading is important right? Some kids need a little incentive. I have found the anticipation of getting to socializing with others their age each week about things they enjoy to be a great motivator to read for those that dislike to!

Weekly emails are sent in advance containing all of the info for each upcoming meeting so everyone can come prepared. In addition to the info, you will also receive “book club only” FREEBIES (such as worksheets, coloring pages, etc) with each new book choice that typically coincide with the book being read at the time. The FREEBIES are not mandatory to use or bring to meetings, they are simply there to help those that wish to use them stay on track with the reading and education process, or to use in your curriculum.

Meetings last 30-60 minutes (I set aside an hour just to be safe) to give each child a fair chance to talk at least once. The world may not be fair, but our book club can be! In your welcome email you will receive a copy of the book club rules, however if you’d like them now you can get a downloadable copy below. You’ll also receive printable, themed book marks for each book read and, when possible, coloring pages! Because who doesn’t like to color right? The kids will also get to share the worksheets if they do them and do a little show and tell each week before we start if they’d like.

We’ll be reading books such as Charlottes Web, the Unfortunate series, Magic Treehouse series, Spiderwick Chronicles series, the Harry Potter series, and possibly one of the many Goosebumps books. The “choose your own ending” books could be very fun for the kids, and spark some interesting conversations for them since, most likely, they wouldn’t all go on the same reading adventure! It could be fun to talk about how each persons path went with the different choices everyone made!

I will take favorite book request from everyone involved to add to our reading list (as long as it’s an appropriate choice) and try my best to work as many as I can in! I want to keep the books fun for the kids, while also avoiding anything that may offend anyone; such as any religious based books. I want it to be a safe space for everyone involved! Again, the world may not be fair, but our book club can be! I will let the kids vote on books and other club issues as much as possible to keep things all about them!

Obviously I’d love everyone interested to participate with every book chosen each time, but if something is chosen that you don’t want to read for whatever reason feel free to skip that book and swing back by the club for the next book you’re interested in. I’ll send emails out regarding each book chosen before hand so everyone can decide whether or not to participate each time. Also, if there is a book chosen that you’d like to participate in, but don’t have and can’t get for whatever reason, please let me know! I will do my absolute best to work it out somehow for you to participate. I do have it now worked out to send a copy of most (if not all), books chosen to you, all for FREE of course. The books I don’t have to send will either be sent to you in a video or audio recording of it being read by myself or one of our amazing club member reading volunteers as needed! I want to do everything I can to make sure everyone that wants to be involved can be however I can!

Please, keep in mind that while this is meant to be fun and educational, it is also meant to be a way for children to interact with peers, help with social skills, and possibly meet others their age and maybe make some new friends! I do request parents attend (or at least be near enough) to aid your children, at least for the first few meetings they attend until they are used to how things run. They may need help following the conversation, waiting their turn to talk, paying attention and being respectful when others are speaking so they may learn something or be able to comment on what was said, etc. I would love to be able to help each child with anything they may need assistance with, unfortunately if I stop to do so we may run out of time for every child to participate. I will help as much as possible, but parents being there will defiantly help things run smoother.

You will receive a email to confirm that you’ll be attending your first meeting. If you do not reply you will NOT receive the meeting link the day of the meeting. I do this to make sure no bots or solicitors have snuck in. You do only need to sign up below once to be added to the book club mailing list to receive the necessary info, even if you are signing up multiple children.

Once you sign up below, you will get a reply with the book we’ll be reading, along with any other info needed. 3-4 days before each meeting you will receive your FREEBIES, and any other info needed at that time. Please read EVERYTHING in your emails and downloads, even if you are in both book clubs and it appears the info is the same. It may be similar, but the info for each club will NOT be the exact same! If you have any questions about anything PLEASE just e-mail me literally anytime, as much as you want!

MEETING LINK INFO: You will receive the link to the meeting the day of, about 30-60 min before it begins each week! I generate a new meeting link every week to make sure nobody gets the info that should not have it! I do everything possible to make sure these meetings stay safe for our children because that’s the most important thing here!

If it’s your first meeting, I’d like each child to come prepared to introduce themselves (first names only) and share 1-2 quick things about themselves (fav. food, color, book, hobby, etc.), including something for a quick “show and tell” (that we’ll do every week) if they’d like. Please remember to read the book club rules in your upcoming email or get a downloadable copy now below!

If you have any questions or concerns you’d like addressed before committing to the club please feel free to contact me before signing up at thehomeschoolhelpdeskbookclub@gmail.com or by clicking HERE! If you would like to schedule a zoom/video meeting with me before signing up for the book club, I’m happy to do it. Being a parent myself, I know the desire to protect your children as much as possible, and the internet is full of crazy people sadly. So, if meeting beforehand helps put you at ease I am absolutely happy to do that!

Note about books sent: Some of the books I send may be in a weird format and need a PDF reader to open. I am working on converting them all, but until I can, you can get a FREE program called WPS that will open anything I send you, ever! It’s amazing! It’s basically a free version of Windows Office. You can get a paid version to do a little more with it, but honestly you don’t really need to, it already offers so much for free! It’s what I use for literally everything; anything I send to the clubs, open, read, edit documents in almost every format (including any and all of the formats the books I send you are in), and anything I post on the The Homeschool Help Desk site! The link to download the WPS program for FREE is linked here, as you can see. There is also an app version linked here as well from Google Play and the Apple store. If you create an account (it’s free) you can work on, or read anything you save to the cloud across all of your devices!

Book club meetings are held weekly on Sundays only currently! Sign up now!

Note: This club is typically enjoyed best by ages 6-11, but the age range is just a suggestion. Older and/or younger children are welcome to join if you think they would enjoy it and be able to participate properly. Older children may greatly enjoy a lot of what we read. Remember, you can pick and choose the books to participate in. Siblings/friends/guest are welcome to sit in on the club meetings. I will do my best to include any children that sit in on the meetings as much as possible, provided they can and want to be included! They are welcome to just hangout too though. As long as everyone remains respectful of others, and nobody interrupts the children talking, it’s fine. I am working on adding more specifically for older children, but for now I only have this club and The Little Readers Club active. Please bear with me! In order to keep everything FREE, I run the HHD site, the book clubs, and other HHD things completely on my own!

Check out some of the crafts we have been doing in our book clubs HERE or on the arts and crafts page!!

If you would like to be in multiple meetings so you can participate with multiple books, just let me know in the note section of the sign up form and I’ll set that up for you!

Book Club Rules!

After signing up, if you haven’t received your welcome email after 24 hours, or your not getting weekly info/reminder emails, check your spam. Unfortunately, not often, but on occasion they do go to spam, and if you don’t mark the email address as safe they’ll continue to. If you have checked your inbox and spam and still received nothing, please feel free to contact me about it. I do my best to get to every email, but as I said, I run everything on my own so sometimes I do miss things sadly.

Book Club Crafts

The photos below are the crafts we have done in our book club meetings. Each craft is themed to the book read that week! These are all very simple and cheap to do! Join one of our book clubs HERE to get the FREE downloads used to do these fun crafts! Not all of the crafts we do come from downloads though! Don’t miss out on all of the creative fun and more! Sign up now!! Big thank you to the club members that send photos of the crafts we do when finished!

Check out some of the crafts we have been doing in our book clubs HERE!!

Important! Signing up for book club does NOT get you added to the main HHD mailing list to receive free packs weekly. You are NOT required to sign up for the HHD site mailing list to join book club, however if you’d like to so you can receive those freebies as well, you can do so at the bottom of this (or any HHD) page! You can check out the other FREEBIES on the HHD site using the links below!

To Join The FREE Little Readers Social Book Club Click HERE!!!!

Little Readers Club summery; click the link to find out more and sign up: In this club we read the books together during the weekly meetings, taking turns reading for those that choose to. After, we discuss the book a little. We spend the rest of the time working on social skills by playing games, doing crafts, and free discussion time. The age range is just a suggestion. Older and/or younger children are welcome if you think they would enjoy it and be able to participate properly.