Last week, for Read Across America week, students at the McGuffey PK-8 School joined thousands of children nationwide who participated in Read Across America week, we had several events.
The longstanding national reading effort, which this year ran March 2 to 6, focused on celebrating reading, promoting literacy, and highlighting diverse, inclusive books for children. Initiated by the National Education Association in 1998, this national event features themes like “Champion Kindness.”
Here are some highlights from McGuffey’s activities:
- K-2 & 3-5 Family Fluency events were held on Thursday and Friday. Parents were invited to come in to learn more about reading fluency. We started off with a brief presentation in the cafeteria teaching families what fluency is, why it matters, what fluency sounds like, and strategies for improving fluency at home. Parents then transitioned to their child’s classroom where they practiced the different strategies with their child. The teachers modeled choral reading, echo reading, and partner reading before the students and parents practiced together. Each grade level added their own twists to the activities in the classrooms. Kindergarten had race cars that they used to read fluently across sentence strips of words they are learning. Other grades had cards with different ways to practice reading fluently such as “read like a monster”, or “read like a newscaster”. All students K-5 received a book to take home to practice reading fluency and parents received a folder with fluency information as well as grade level reading tips.
- In 6-8, we held our first, “Blind Date with a Book” where students went on “speed dates” with different books. The books were completely covered and had clues on the front and a quote on the back. Students explored the different books without seeing the cover to see if they could figure out the genre, what the book was about, and decide if they were interested in the book. At the end of the class period, students got to rank the books from their favorite to least favorite. The next day, all grade 6-8 students received one of their top choices of books to read during class and answer questions about the book. At the end of the class period, all students got to take home the book they chose. On Final Forms, we sent home a parent informational sheet sharing ways that parents can help engage their middle school reader at home with their new book.
