Online Book Communities - What Are They?

Online Book Communities - What are they and why should you use one?

I looked at 5 different online book communities.  I have shown you a picture of each of my bookshelves in each community along with some other tidbits of information.

The first was Biblionasium.  I really loved how kid friendly the site is, it's  bright, colorful and fun.  You can create accounts for students, parents and as educators.  I like how each day when you log in, they have suggestions that pop up.   I like how as an educator you have the ability to set up reading logs, and can make reading challenges for your kids, there are resources with lots of articles, fun stuff, etc.  They also allow you to manage groups, send messages, buy books, and complete reports based on how you use the site.  I also like the suggested reading tab, it has great shelves with lots of good reading choices for kids.  I really how it looks like a shelf when you put books on your shelf unlike some of the other communities that I will discuss below.  This is a site that I had already created an account for and I plan to use it with my students when I can even though I am not their reading teacher.  I think this is a great site for educators and students.

The second online book community I looked at was Goodreads.  I have been a member on Goodreads for a few years and I am not using it to it's full potential.  I had never created a shelf.   I do think that think the look is very plain with just a white background.  I went to the My Books tab and created my shelf.  You can  mark them as All, Read, Currently Reading, and To Read.  I do like how you can arrange the books by author or title.   I like that you can create multiple lists and I made one for school.  I like to keep my school books and the books I read for personal enjoyment separate.  It has a Recommendations tab but it won't have any available for you until you have created 20 reviews.  That seems like a lot of reviews to get a book recommendation but it is customized to your likes and interests.  There is also a Groups tab were you can join groups with similar interests.  The explore tab has a books of the month sections,  give aways, top reviews and new releases.  I didn't like the site as much for use in a school setting but I do think it's a great place to find book reviews and photo's of books when creating annotated bibliographies.

Librarything was the third site that I looked at and created a shelf  on. .  You can arrange the books on the shelf by list or covers.  I did like that this site gives recommendations based on the books on your shelf.  It also gives you reviews regarding and there is also a library statistics tab that has all kinds of information regarding the the books on your shelf.  There are also pictures of the authors on the Authors Tab.  When you add books you can search for them on Amazon and even Library of Congress.  It also Groups for similar interest, a Talk tab that has a message board, and a Local tab to help find things that are local.  I really liked this site for me personally.  It has so many neat tabs that give great information about books.  I did not find this site to be as kid friendly.  It's great to find books for kids but not as geared to the primary age that I deal with on a daily basis.  Another thing they even have an IPhone App.  Great site and I can't believe I am just finding out about it.

The fourth site I looked into was Shelfari.  Shelfari is linked to your Amazon account.  I do like how you can separate your books into  I've Read, I'm Reading Now, and I Plan to Read.  You can create goals, there are groups to discuss books and author pages.  Again, I feel that this site would be good for older kids or personal use but not for my primary kids.  I does have under  your profile a space to add friends, block users   I had problems accessing the site on more than one occasion and more than one day.  It said that they were aware of the problem and working on it, but it was frustrating.   Hopefully when you are accessing they have fixed the problems and you will not run into any potential problems like I did.  

Booklikes was the last community that I visited.  You can create different shelves, read, planning to read, currently reading, or add your own shelf.  They have a timeline, blog, discussions and friends.  I am just not a fan of this site.  I found it hard to navigate and it just didn't excite me.  I did like the Book Catalog but it wasn't the easiest to find with the drop down tabs. It had many different genres listed and once clicking on them you could find new releases. There are also Apps which have reading list, challenges and compare books (where you compare your books with someone else-don't know who the person was, which I thought was weird).  They also have giveaways but you have to set up your profile and the webpage and add books and ratings to your shelf to take part in their giveaways.  There are also events (ex. book releases), book clubs (which you can join or create), daily deals (books on sale) and goodies (create a shelf widget, so that you can share and a follow button).  I find that it is also geared toward older students and for personal use.  I did like the goodies tab and found that it would be helpful.  

Find one that meets your criteria.  I really like Biblionasium for school.  It has many tools to use to help your students make goals and to help you with data and finding books.  I like Goodreads for my personal stuff.  I really enjoy finding books on there and reading the reviews.  I hope to really have more time and continue to explore and find out more about these various online book communities.  Find what suits you and read, read, read!