From the TRC: NoveList Plus

It’s Thursday, and a new edition of From the TRC is published to highlight another service or resource Joyner Library’s Teaching Resources Center has to support the College of Education’s faculty and students. This week, it’s NoveList Plus.

This week’s post builds on a previous post we wrote about TeachingBooks.net. While TeachingBooks.net focuses on bringing the author to your students so students can experience how their favorite authors create and read their own works, NoveList Plus can help educators match readers with the right books to expand students’ literary world beyond the familiar.

NoveList Plus bills itself as a comprehensive online readers’ advisory (RA) tool used to search hundreds of thousands of popular fiction and nonfiction titles, which includes categories such as author read-alikes, book lists, and book discussion guides. It includes genre outlines and online training materials for librarians to familiarize staff with appeal factors, the RA interview, and other aspects of readers’ advisory.

Sounds like a resource for school librarians, right? Of course it is, but my experience as a teacher and school librarian has taught me that students won’t always turn to their librarian for book recommendations. Students will reach out to the teacher they feel most comfortable with for reading advice. At the high school where I worked in Arizona, the English Department and I constructed and continuously updated a bulletin board highlighting the most recent books the staff had read. Students paid attention to which staff member’s interests matched their own, and turned to them for recommendations. I think it is a safe bet to say the English Department used NoveList Plus more than I did!

The teachers I’ve worked with loved the fact that NoveList Plus includes Lexile measures, book reviews, and lists the awards a book has won. Take a look at “The Crossover” which was awarded the 2015 Newbery Medal.

Here are other tools and resources NoveList Plus offers educators at all levels:

Professional Toolbox
- Common Core Connections focuses on nonfiction titles and offers standards-based questions that can be used to deepen student learning. It includes supplemental lists, Picture Book Extenders (See Julie Fogliano’s “And Then It’s Spring”), and video tutorials. Categorized by subject & grade level (K-7).
- Reader’s Advisory (RA) Toolbox offers a wealth of information on reader’s advisory professional development, learning about genres, books lists based on the season of the year, and an RA News Newsletter.
- Working with Youth is a valuable resource for educators and parents who either need a refresher or are unfamiliar with what students are reading in their English/Language Arts classrooms (Grouped by ages 0-8, 9-12, and 13-18), and how to use those books as a jumping off point to other titles. This month’s newsletter starts the conversation on summer reading.
Read-alikes
- Love an author, but have already read all of their books? Finished a series and disappointed there aren’t more to read? Each book and author in NoveList Plus is paired with other books and authors that are similar to your favorites. Here is an example from George R. R. Martin’s A Game of Thrones, and Sherman Alexie’s author page.
Genre Overviews
- Keeping Up…Genres covers “core genre essentials, links to key awards, lots of lists and on-point articles to help readers find the perfect genre match.”

NoveList Plus also offers a robust Support Center complete with an archive of training sessions, tutorials and additional materials such as “Help Sheets” and PowerPoint presentations to help you maximize NoveList’s resources. Finally, watch their “News and Events” page for professional development webinars, press releases and new product demonstrations.

Until next time…Dan Z. in the TRC

Click here to view the archive of all From the TRC posts.

From the TRC: NoveList Plus

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