6 Ways to Upgrade Old-School Book Reports

For English language arts (ELA) teachers, it’s the million-dollar question: After students have finished reading a book, how do you assess what they’ve learned?

The traditional, decades-old answer is to have students submit a written book report. But today, teachers are increasingly looking for something fresh. “Book reports are outdated concepts,” teacher Lisa Quesada told us on Facebook—one of many dozens who said they’re opting for new alternatives.

Book reports aren’t only in need of a rebrand; many teachers say they aren’t all that academically valuable either. When asked to hand in a report analyzing the themes of a book, many students default to turning in “little more than poorly disguised plagiarized summaries,” writes high school teacher Ileana Sherry. Lately, AI has made this even easier.

Luckily, there are creative alternatives to the traditional book report that get students engaging in rigorous literary analysis without stifling their love of reading. These approaches—often involving multimedia, role-playing, and discussions—can be not only more fun for students, but more academically enriching too, giving kids a broad range of options to demonstrate what they learned from a book.

We consulted research and surveyed our community of teachers to compile six creative substitutes for book reports that are worth trying in your classroom.

Make a Short Film

Allowing students to visualize their insights related to a book they’ve read, and “build non-linguistic representations of what a text is about,” can lead to improved comprehension, researchers explain in a 2024 report. Studies show these visualizations can also have “a positive effect on reluctant readers’ attitudes toward and engagement in reading.”

The researchers suggest that one of the most effective activities is asking students to create book trailers, which, like movie trailers, advertise the highlights of a given book. Trailers can include student dramatizations of key scenes from the book, visual expressions of the main themes, or details about how characters interact or change throughout a book. Researchers say that introducing students to some filmmaking fundamentals can improve their productions (see the handout below for some basics to cover).

Beyond trailers, there are a variety of other video-based alternatives to book reports. After his students read The Catcher in the Rye, English teacher Jason DeHart prompts them to respond with a video—but gives them freedom over the format. Some students produce what he calls “Zeitgeist Poems”; they write a reflection in response to the book, record themselves reading it, then edit together a montage of still images that match the tone of their words. Others choose to reenact a meaningful scene somewhere on campus.

Try raising the stakes for students by creating authentic audiences to target and entice with their films—such as their fellow classmates, grade-level peers, or parents, or even the judges of contests like the 90-Second Newbery Film Festival, suggests librarian Eti Bee on Facebook.

Create a One-Pager

Rather than having students write lengthy book reports, many educators are opting for a “one-pager” approach, which “challenges kids to summarize the story, the theme, characters, setting, and important symbols from the book—all on one page,” writes educator Erin Guiltner on Instagram.

One-pagers can help students “think deeply about a text” and use their creativity to “represent its most important aspects,” writes educator and consultant Betsy Potash, adding that students who create one-pagers often make “a deeper connection to the text and have better retention of key concepts.”

Teachers can give students specific guidance about what they should include in their one-pagers, including key characters, “important quotes (with explanations),” and a short teaser summary, comments educator Olivia Bartley on Facebook. Middle school teacher Lisa Kay Holguin asks students to “create a brochure that ‘sells’ the book”—on which students draw the characters, describe their motives and traits, and summarize the main thrust of the story without giving away any spoilers.

After students in Sara Ransom Daub’s high school English class submit one-pagers, she asks them to “explain their choices and interpretations, supported with direct quotes from the text, in a short audio or video recording, or a presentation, or even a one-on-one conference.” According to Daub, one-pagers are “often the best work I get out of a student the whole semester.”

Make a Companion Book

To make literary analysis more engaging, middle school language arts teacher Katie R. Medill has her students create “companion books” to accompany the works they’re reading. “Companion books aim to provide readers a deeper understanding of concepts in the original work,” Medill explains. “They target an audience who has already read—and enjoyed—the text but want to know more about it or wish it never ended.”

A good companion book is less like a summary, Medill writes, and more like a work of analysis; they “teach readers about ideas, concepts, or references they may have missed,” elaborating on key quotes and discussing how they’re tied to broader themes. Many famous series—from Star Wars to Harry Potter—have spawned a wide variety of popular companion books, Medill notes.

Medill has students work on their companion books in small groups—with each group brainstorming a list of potential chapters to include, then divvying up those chapters based on each student’s particular interests. “This way, I can still give [students] individual grades based only on their contributed chapters,” Medill notes. In addition to their written analysis, Medill encourages students to incorporate design elements using platforms like Canva.

“While students will likely balk at the task of writing an essay on the theme of The Outsiders, an assignment to collaborate with classmates and contribute a few chapters for a companion book to The Outsiders can almost sound fun,” Medill writes, “especially if students get to choose the focus of their own chapters (e.g., ‘Symbolism and Staying Gold’ and ‘Foreshadowing Death’).”

Medill also gives students the opportunity to make their companion books public—and imbue their work with more meaning—by making physical copies using Book Creator, then barcoding and shelving them in the school’s library. With the help of the school’s librarian, she organizes a fun book signing event, too.

Interview a Character

The mock interview is a popular, adaptable activity, and many teachers put their own creative spin on it.

In one version of this strategy, a single student is put in the “hot seat as the main character, taking questions from the class—both on the surface level about events in the book, but also deeper questions requiring inference, like about their motivations and feelings at particular moments,” comments educator Susanne D. on our site. For instance, if one student acts as Jay Gatsby, others can ask him, “So how did you really make all your money?” and “How did seeing that green light at the end of the dock make you feel?” In a similar approach, students in Terri Jensen Allen’s class run a fake talk show where “the interviewer asks each character questions, and [students] answer from that character’s perspective.”

The mock interview can also work well as a paired activity. Teacher Belinda B. has one student role-play as an interviewer and another as the book’s author. They record their conversation—either on video, like a live TV interview, or on audio, like a podcast—and turn in the final product for a grade. Alternatively, individual students can do a solo version of this assessment in writing: “I do an ‘imagined interview’ assignment, where students pick a book character and have to answer as both the interviewer and the interviewee,” comments educator Kim Bevier on Instagram.

Turn Class Into a Book Club

In-class discussions—similar in style to the book clubs many adults participate in—are a popular method teachers use to get students to collectively analyze the texts they read.

Whether you opt for full-class or small group discussions, it’s important to keep them well-structured, notes English teacher and instructional consultant Beth Pandolpho. In Pandolpho’s class, each small group book club discussion “has a specific focus, such as character, theme, writing style, or how fiction reveals truth,” she writes.

“Students arrive having read the agreed-upon number of pages (as decided by their book club) as well as having prepared a task for the day’s focus (as decided by me).” For instance, before a discussion on “character,” Pandolpho asked students to choose a character “and mark in their book where they learned about the character through what he says, how he acts, and what others say about him.”

Similarly, when educator Heather Hendrix Wright breaks her students into small discussion groups, she provides them with a rubric laying out what their discussions should include. “I then have them record their conversations and submit the recording for my evaluation,” she writes on Instagram. “Recording it holds them accountable and keeps their conversations on track.”

To make ELA discussions more welcoming, some teachers try to directly harness the fun, casual energy of book clubs. “We sat around having snacks and drinks talking about our books,” commented educator Regina Watts on Facebook. “I knew which books they were reading so I always had questions to gauge their comprehension.”

Write Some Fan Fiction

If you really want students to engage with a text, the best option may be to have them extend it. For example, after his students read Animal Farm, educator Harry Shontz “had them write different ‘Chapter 11s’ about other Cold War hot spot events using the framework and allegory from the original text.”

Coach and educator Elena Aguilar seconds the approach: “Asking students to create an alternative ending to a book—one that makes sense—pushes them to really demonstrate an understanding of characters and plot,” she writes. Meanwhile, on Edutopia, educator Eri P. says that she has students either rewrite a scene or write an entirely new “deleted” scene. The deleted scene “would have to have connections to other parts of the book,” which “helps you assess if they know what is going on.”

However, generating an entirely new work of fiction to build on a book requires a good deal more effort than some other strategies we’ve mentioned, so be sure to give students ample writing time if you do opt for this approach.