The students of Barrhead Elementary School are trying to read their way around the world by keeping track of the number of minutes the students spend with a book in their hands.
Their first stop is in St. John’s, Newfoundland, just 6,300 kilometers from Barrhead, a goal that they were hoping to reach by the end of September.
The students managed to read their way to St. John’s, and the committee in charge of the project will be deciding on their next stop on the map.
The Barrhead Literacy Project kick-off started for the first time this year, and there are plenty of things planned to keep the students busy reading.
In order to get the project rolling, the school held an assembly for the students, where three very popular book characters made an appearance.
Clifford the Big Red Dog, Aaron the Blue Heron, and Geronimo Stilton handed out bookmarks to all of the kids who will be participating in the project.
The school has a goal that does not only include helping children discover a love for reading.
“This is our literacy goal that we have for this school year, and that is to focus on improving students comprehension, fluency, and appreciation of reading,” Julie Smith, Vice Principal of BES said. “That is why we came up with this school wide reading project.”
The school decided to participate in the program because it was in line with their overall goals.
“Because of our education plan and our focus on reading and improving student’s reading… we thought let’s put all our efforts into this one project this year, and see where we can go,” Smith said.
This year’s school committee created the project, putting as much creativity into the idea as possible in hopes of getting kid’s reading.
Making a video is one of the ways the committee is hoping will help raise the enthusiasm for picking up a book.
Each class has been asked to make a two-minute video, which will then be watched by the school at the end of year assembly.
“We gave all the grade groups a challenge to produce a one to two minute video on reading,” Smith explained.
Some of the examples they showed the student’s included music videos, which were created by other schools looking to promote reading.
The project is not just during school hours, but can also be completed from the comfort of home.
Teachers who wish can allow their students to keep track at home, and use those minutes as a way of helping them push forward with their goal.
Drop Everything and Read (DEAR) is when students stop what they are doing and pick up a book. This is something Barrhead Elementary has been doing for some time, but coincides with their current project.
“That is something we have always done as a school,” Smith said.
Smith added that reading at home is just as important as reading at school, and that there are many benefits for the children when reading is a part of their lives.
“Research shows if parents read to their kids they will do better,” Smith said. “There are so many things competing for their time outside of school, as well as inside of school really and just to bring back that love of reading.”
A map of the world can be seen just outside of the office, where the grades are tracking their progress.
“So many units of reading equates a number of kilometers they go,” Smith said, adding that just ten minutes a day with 20 students in a classroom works out to several thousand minutes in one month. One hundred minutes represents one kilometre travelled on the map.
Each grade is identified by a different colour of ribbon, Smith said.
Next to the map is a board of fun facts for students, including many facts about Canada.
To keep things fresh there are several themes that will be read throughout the school year.
Each theme lasts two months, and varies from sci-fi, fantasy, and poetry to biographies.
The committee also wants students to understand that reading doesn’t always mean picking up a book.
“There are so many different ways to read. It doesn’t have to be a book, it can be on the screen as well,” Smith said. “There are all kinds of online books that are shared with students.”
The committee is hoping to start a community volunteer reader program in the near future, where volunteers can come in and listen to the kids read.
This time spent will also be tracked and used to reach their overall goal, travelling the world one book at a time.
