Info, Tips & Tricks

Sign-ups for the October 22, 2011 Read-A-Thon are happening now on the main Read-A-Thon site!

What Are Read-A-Thon Cheerleaders?

Cheerleaders offer support to all of the readers during the Read-A-Thon by leaving comments on blogs. Cheerleading does not have to be a 24 hour commitment. You can participate for anywhere from 1 hour to 24 hours.

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I Signed Up…Now What?

After signing up as a cheerleader you will be assigned to a cheerleading squads. Each squad will be responsible for cheering for a group of readers. We ask that you visit the readers assigned to your team equally. This does not mean that you can’t visit other blogs! If you have friends who are reading, you are certainly welcome to cheer for them as well. But you are assigned to a team to ensure that all readers will receive encouragement from the cheerleaders. You may not be able to visit all the blogs assigned to your squad…this is okay. Cheering should not cause stress. Just visit who you can.

A few readers may not have blogs. As we identify these readers, we will make note on the Reader List page. Some readers may stop early, or may not have been able to participate after all. We will try to make note of this, as well.

Also, please remember that all readers are different. Not everyone is reading for the full 24 hours. And not everyone reads at the same pace. Teresa at Shelf Love has an interesting post that addresses this. It’s worth reading to get a reader’s perspective.

What’s the “Right Way” to Cheer?

Cheerleading can take different forms. Some cheerleaders chose to offer an encouraging phrase (“keep up the good work!” “you can do it!”), others might take the silly route (“Austen, Hemingway, Rushdie, Poe…if they were here, I’m sure they’d say hello!”). There is no right or wrong way to cheer. The most important thing is to leave comments and let the readers know that they have people cheering them on.

A few tips that might come in handy:

• Prepare a few cheers/phrases ahead of time. You might consider saving a file with a variety of cheers…and then every hour you can cut and paste one of the cheers as a comment for all of your assigned readers. IF YOU DO THIS, please be sure to add a personal note to your comment so that the participant knows you took a minute to read his or her update — don’t just copy and paste over and over!
• Find some short poems or cheers and modify them to fit the Read-A-Thon. No one says you have to be original and start from scratch! If you want to make up a few rhymes, rhymezone.com is a handy resource. You can also google cheerleading cheers, or poems, and modify what you find so that it applies to reading. Jill and Trish have come up with some fun ways to get the energy going in the past, if you need some inspiration!
• Comment on what readers’ progress, books, minichallenge participation…anything in their updates! Readers really appreciate these kinds of comments because they show you took a moment to check in with what they’re doing.
• Offer cheers on Twitter! The Read-A-Thon uses the hashtag #readathon.
• And check out Beth F’s post about her cheerleading experience during a Read-A-Thon. She was sent to time-out and couldn’t cheer!

If you have any tips or tricks of your own to share, please leave a comment!