When Andrea Castro’s third grade class entered the cafeteria,
the students went into a frenzy.
Gilroy – When Andrea Castro’s third grade class entered the cafeteria, the students went into a frenzy.
The rush wasn’t to get food, but to get a glimpse of Rod Kelley Elementary School’s new reading board, where teachers post their favorite children’s books. Students use recess and extra lunch time to crowd around the board and read recommendations, look at teachers’ childhood pictures – posted next to their picks – and search out candid pictures of students reading books.
“This I think is a perfect way for kids to see that teachers care about books and to to show that reading can be fun.,” said third-grade teacher Jennifer Evans, who put the board together.
Though the wall’s information has only been posted for about a week, students have already started reading recommended books. Students in one fifth-grade class were also inspired to start their own reading wall in their classroom.
The reading walls will help students generate a list of good books and spread their recommendations to others, 10-year-old Alma Maya said.
This will, in turn, lead to increased achievement within and outside of the classroom, 10-year-old Jayde Chabarria said.
“It will help you learn more and it gives you good vocabulary,” she said.
Principal Luis Carrillo – who recommended “No Talking,” a novel about a silence contest between fifth-grade boys and girls – has made reading and encouraging recreational reading priorities this year. Increased reading leads to increased achievement, he said, using a 1988 Reading Research Quarterly study to back him up.
“It’s a concern for us because we feel that reading really is the gateway for all the subject areas,” he said. “If a child is not able to read and understand what he’s reading, he’s going to have some difficulties along the way.”
Carrillo and teachers planned multiple events throughout the year, including a Dress Up As a Book Character Day and a festival where each child publishes a short book they write, to encourage reading. The school has also been conversing with parents about having them encourage reading at home. They will even be setting up a weekly Turn Off the TV Day in hopes children will read or play board games as an alternative.
“The whole idea is really to get the kids to practice,” Carrillo said. “We can tell them all about reading, we can tell them all about reading skills, but if they can’t put all those skills together, then we haven’t done our job.”
