What is the difference between a "report" and a "research project"? The difference comes in the purpose. A report presents or summarizes information that is readily available while a research project presents information that is not readily available. Other than the purpose, the forms of writing don't look a whole lot different. For example, you can report today's weather by looking at a single resource. Hmmm, its raining. You don't have to do a lot of research to find out. On the other hand, if you want to explain the climatic change that relates to that rain, you will probably have to do some research and look at a lot of different sources. Notice that your report had a single focus (rain) while the research took into account several points of focus and showed how they interacted.
Primary Level: Kindergarten to Grade 3
Book Report writing (or telling), can begin very early. In Kindergarten you can do very informal book reporting by encouraging the student to tell about a book they like. What was the most exciting or interesting part? Would they like to hear the book read to them again, why or why not? All written language skills begin orally, so this is an excellent way to begin the writing process. It is similar to “narration: telling others what you have just learned,” only in a book report the focus is on “telling others what was in the book and what you think about it.”
Once the student is writing complete sentences, encourage simple written book reports. Here are the main ingredients:
- The title of your book.
- Who wrote the book.
- Something you liked about the book. (1-4 sentences)
- Where to find the book.
In classrooms, book reports are given so other students can hear about a book someone else has read and through this sharing be motivated to read the book themselves. In the home it is a good way to challenge the student to remember what they have read and perhaps if siblings are close enough in age they can be motivated to read the book their brother or sister has read.
For advanced primary students they may be ready to include more information in their book report: setting, characters, plot /conflict (the problem needing to be solved in the book), and resolution. Or more simply, you may ask the student to write about the beginning, middle and end of a story.
Level: Grade 4 and Above
First step: Choose a book. This can be a daunting task for some students. If you don’t enjoy reading the best place to start is you. What interests you? Think about your hobbies, sports interests, animals, types of people that interest you, do you enjoy non-fiction or fiction more?? The list of questions you could ask may be short or long but take your interests to the library and ask the librarian to help you find a book in one of those areas.
Some book categories that may help you identify an interest are:
- Biography
- Mystery
- Adventure
- Animal Story
- Science Fiction
- Biblical History
- Fantasy
- Classics
- Historical Fiction
- True Story
Second step: Basic Book Report Writing Essentials:
- Title and author’s name (and don’t forget your own name as the author of the book report.)
- Compose a theme statement: The theme is the main idea of the story. For instance, in the book “Charlie and the Chocolate Factory,” the theme might be that greed is ugly and unrewarded. To help you figure out what the theme is in your book, ask yourself these questions:
- What does the main character learn by the end of the book?
- What is the author’s main purpose in writing the book?
- Summarize the story: The summary is different from the theme because in the summary you tell what happens in the story, especially what happens to the main character. Be sure you have a beginning, middle, and an ending in your summary, just as you would in a story.
- Give your opinion. End your book report by saying whether or not you like the book and whether or not you would recommend it to your friends to read.
- From here you can add in pictures and decorative style that would enhance your reports appearance and make it appealing to your readers. One suggestion is drawing a light picture about some part of your book on the entire page of the report. Then write or type over this picture with a black marker or bold type that would show up well with the picture as your background.
Book Report Templates are a convenient way to provide a framework for a book report. Three downloads are provided below: