Tree of Learning

This is the 2nd time I used tree to show the progress of students in reading. I called it first "Tree of Knowledge". When they reached a certain number of borrowed books they will get a leaf where they put their name and class. In my first school it was successful. Children are so proud to see their names displayed on the wall as the tree grows and wanted to borrow more books to display more leaves under their name. Children has made it a really big and healthy tree that we have to make another one (in the same year) to accommodate all the leaves.

On my 2nd attempt to use it to display children's progress on their reading, I called it "Tree of Learning" to fit on the school's language used. I wasn't successful this time as the students doesn't care if their name was displayed or not. It didn't drive them to get more books to read. The tree looks like a malnourished that I have to put it down in the middle of the year. I gave a leaf for students who are included in the library's top borrowers since the system we are using do not alert us if a student reach a certain number of books.

There are teachers who raised the issue that children will just borrow books but not read it at all. In my perspective, that's alright. It starts when they get a book and browse over the pages even without reading it. We all starts looking on pictures of the book before we love to read. That's the main objective of this display - to draw their attention to look and eventually love a book.