The second in a 4-part series regarding the importance of reading to and with young children in support of a new literacy initiative the Dane G. Hansen Foundation in northwest Kansas.
To teach and give children the tools to overcome the reading barrier is an awe-inspiring moment. For a child to sit with a grandparent or someone from an older generation and have that person deliver praise for their reading abilities, will help set that child on a path to a love learning.
Logan Elementary school in Logan, Kansas rolled out a summer reading program this past June. Thanks to a generous donation from the Dane G. Hansen foundation, we were able to purchase a wide variety of literary books for our students.
The books arrived after school had already dismissed for the summer, so we struggled a bit to get the word out to our families. We attempted to accomplish this by have our teachers reach out through their class lists and by the use of social media. Students were able to come to the school and view all of the books we had purchased. They were spread out across our auditorium’s stage. We provided them with a tote bag in which to store their books. Students were allowed to pick up to ten books to take home and enjoy. We had several students that made regular stops throughout the summer exchanging books.
We wanted to work with the surrounding community libraries and their summer reading programs. We hoped that our program would work in conjunction with theirs. To assist in this, Logan schools donated an older IPad to each of the three libraries in our surrounding communities. We provided training and software to the librarians. This enables our students to be able to attend the libraries and take Accelerated Reading tests over the books that they had read. Accelerated reading tests measures the student’s comprehension of the material contained in the book. We had several students show a dramatic increase in reading.
Several students were encouraged to work with our local nursing home and assisted living homes. These students would take books down and read to the residents. This is a continuation of our commitment to give back to our community from our elementary students.
The opportunity to engage students with books and to help foster a love for reading is a gift of a lifetime. When a child becomes aware of words on a page, and understands that they are not able to understand those words, they feel a sense of isolation from the book. It forces them to understand that they have a dependence on someone else to provide them the information contained within. It becomes a sense of being left out. When a child learns to read and begins to understand those words, they feel a sense of belonging to a group. It becomes one of our first self-aware barriers to growing up.
David Kirkendall is the Principal for Logan Schools.
Learn more about the importance of reading to your children at NWKansasReads.org.