The Sometimes Hidden Power in Book Trailers and Audiobooks

“Having students create trailers instead of giving traditional presentations opens up the modes and media students can use to communicate. Students can use images, motion or special effects, a recorded soundtrack, and print text to share their thinking, their interpretations, and their critiques of the books they read.”

One of the key skills that can be developed in English class is communication. By giving students the opportunity to create book trailers, communication is emphasized in multiple modes. As an English teacher, I want my students to be proficient in communicating in a variety of ways. The use of book trailers not only enables the classroom environment to be more engaging and interactive but also calls upon students to demonstrate several skills. In addition to developing their communication skills, students also will inevitably access their creative, critical, and independent thinking skills when producing a book trailer. Students essentially have to identify key aspects of literature, piece together the aspects in somewhat cohesive ways, and accompany the aspects with images, sounds, and text to capture the interests of others. If students were simply asked to interpret or analyze novels that they read, there would likely be some resistance and the activity may not fully access the students’ thinking. However, with a book trailer, it is possible that students will be so interested in the dynamism of the activity that they will not be as resistant to the process and will freely access their creative and critical thinking skills without being entirely aware of it. In short, this technology would allow for students to expand their creative, critical, and independent thinking skills while communicating with their peers in multiple modes.

Kajder, S. (2008). The book trailer: engaging teens through technologies. Educational Leadership, 65(6), 20.


“Students should be able to listen and find the magic of interpretation as actors read aloud or participate in dramatizations based on the finest young adult literature.”

Audiobooks can be highly effective in classrooms because reading is modeled for students and the emotions of characters are on display. I found that an audiobook for Romeo and Juliet was especially effective because it enabled students to better understand Shakespeare’s language and to improve their pronunciation skills. Also, allowing students to focus on the actions of characters rather than the language helped to clarify difficult moments in the plot. Overall, I feel that students felt more comfortable with reading Shakespeare after they were repeatedly exposed to the language.

However, I have also found that the pacing in other audiobooks is too fast for students and does not allow them to fully process the reading. After realizing that an audiobook for The Color of Water had fast pacing, did not follow the exact words of the text, and, at times, omitted large passages of the text, I used it only in a supplementary way. In fact, I have never fully replaced my reading and my students’ readings of a text with an audiobook because I want students to improve their own reading skills and not rely on the readings of others. Thus, I typically use audiobooks in a supplementary way. Interestingly, I found that since the audiobook for The Color of Water omitted large passages, I could use this as a learning tool to question my students as to why certain passages were left out. I wanted students to recognize that the audiobook was focusing on main ideas and discarding some of the smaller details, and I had students look at a chapter and identify the main ideas and then observe whether or not the audiobook focused on the same pieces of information.

Weiss, M.J. (2008). The sounds of stories. The Alan Review, 35(3), 79.