Free Literature Circle Role Worksheets for English Teachers

Literature circles are a great way to engage students in a whole class or choice novel unit. If you haven’t tried literature circles before, in short, they are a literary analysis, group discussion activity designed for small groups. Each group member has an individual role that they complete on a their literature circle worksheets (which can be print or digital through Google Slides), then they come together with other class members to present their roles. While one student presents, the rest of the group listens and engages through discussion activities. Next, you can repeat this process so each student completes a different role for subsequent literature circle meetings.

If you want more information on how to facilitate literature circle discussions in an English Language Arts or social studies class, I wrote this blog post that goes into detail for lesson planning and prep. To compliment that information, this post will give you free literature circle role worksheets and graphic organizers, explain new role ideas, and detail how the specific role works. 

Literature Circle Roles

The goal is for the literature circle group to analyze a text in different ways based on your Common Core State Standards or learning goals for the reading unit. Once you have a list of roles that correspond with your text analysis goals, you can modify each task for an appropriate grade level. Therefore, to prepare, you should create clear expectations for each role. This post includes two free literature circles that you can print and use, or you can use them as an inspiration to create your own roles.

The two types of literature circle roles are described below (and a free resource for both is included in your download). The two types are traditional literature circle roles and authentic literature circle roles.

Traditional Literature Circle Roles

Traditional literature circle roles can apply to any grade level, whether you’re teaching 1st grade or 12th grade. Once you have this list, you can adapt to create tasks for members of the group. While the titles of these roles can vary depending on the class or students, the tasks focus on the same concepts. Keep in mind, you only need as many roles as you’ll have in your group. I recommend four to five students in each group, so you’ll rotate your students’ literature circle meetings between four to five times. 

Here is a list of traditional roles that can be given new titles and adapted directions for your students’ goals:

1. Questioner: This role identifies possible questions the group may have and seeks to answer them like an FAQ. 
2. Historian: This role provides background information on the text connections to history, culture, the author, etc. 
3. Discussion director: This role comes up with a list of questions to generate discussion. 
4. Super summarizer: This role provides a brief summary of key points from the shared reading.
5. Literary luminary: This role highlights important literary devices from a passage or reading.
6. Word wizard: This role focuses on vocabulary, specifically on unfamiliar words. 
7. Creative connector: This role makes text-to-world connections. 

Again, these roles can be adapted for any grade level. The key is choosing roles that fit your unit’s goals and then writing very clear expectations for each task. I’ve found that the best way to encourage student engagement during group time is to include a participation element with each role. This prevents students from getting together in a group and then presenting one at a time without engaging in discussion. 

My role worksheets have four sections: role, task, discuss, and participate. Here’s a breakdown of each section for one of my roles:

My Example

Role: Scholar

Task: After reading your text, find two related articles or other academic resources that connect to this topic. Provide brief summaries of what you found and how it connects to the content.

Discuss:  Explain your connections to the group. Then, ask them to share something academically connected to this topic. It could be something from literature, another class or co-curricular, or other content. Record one insight for each group member.

Participate: Use this space to complete tasks and record notes related to your group member’s presentations.

Keep in mind this adaptation is designed for secondary students. You can download all four roles here. This resource is part of my Literary Analysis Toolkit, so when you download this resource, you’ll also get the literary lenses roles described below as well as two other free literary analysis resources.

Authentic Roles

Part of my academic research is using literary lenses to teach perspective-taking in a meaningful way, and literature circles can be adapted beautifully for this purpose. I’ve done so with my free Literary Lenses Roles literature circle adaptation. My goal was to put students in authentic analysis roles, so they could apply a literary lens to their analysis of a text. 

We used these authentic roles with a whole class novel study for “The Turn of the Screw” and for a choice reading unit where students were grouped based on their novel selection. The role page, therefore, identifies one of four roles: Influencer, Critic, Biographer, and Historian. Each role corresponds to a literary lens: Influencer to Reader Lens, Critic to Formal Lens, Biography to Biographical Lens, and Historian to Historical Lens. 

Here’s an example of what these role sheets look like:

1. Description: Influencers have a special talent, skill, or interest on a topic, and they use this niche to influence the opinions of others about this topic.
   • Task: You are a book blogger who writes all about your reactions to the best stories and novels. Using a reader response lens, write a blog post about the story you read in class. Blog posts often start out with a personal connection to the book (paragraph 1). Then, they transition into an explanation of what you liked (paragraph 2) and didn’t like (paragraph 3).
2. Description: Biographers are scholars who write about a person’s life, and they share their findings in books and articles.
   • Task: You are a biographer who is studying the author’s influences for the book you read in class. During your research, you found an artifact about the author’s influences. It might be a letter, photograph, a page from a journal, or an important object. Prepare the artifact for display at the Authors of the World Museum (by creating it). Include a one paragraph description of the artifact explaining what it is and how it influenced the author to write the story.

Again, the different roles described here are all included in your free download. You can download them here. 

For more information

I hope this blog post has inspired you to use literature circles in your classroom the next time you’re planning a literature unit! My secondary students really enjoyed this literary analysis activity as a break from the traditional study guide lesson, and they did such a great job. Now, that I teach pre-service ELA teachers, I love demoing this activity as a great way to improve student engagement, encourage accountability participation, and provide opportunities for collaborative learning. 

For academic support for the value of literature circles, check out: 

• Daniels, H. (2023). Literature circles: Voice and choice in book clubs & reading groups. Routledge.
• Karatay, H. (2017). The Effect of Literature Circles on Text Analysis and Reading Desire. International Journal of Higher Education, 6(5), 65-75.
• Mills, H., & Jennings, L. (2011). Talking about talk: Reclaiming the value and power of literature circles. The Reading Teacher, 64(8), 590-598.