Kids, Warm Food, Cool Free Books

by Lynn Woodworth, EERC Board Member

On a fall ride home from the EERC board meeting, I asked myself (pondered, wondered) how I could contribute to the council and to kids learning to read when I was time and distance away from Eugene.  After reviewing the upcoming events planned for the year, I remembered visiting Gayla Clark at her home and learning about her time spent in a park during the summer reading to kids and giving away books.  As I drove the idea grew into a plan.  Why not adopt Gayla’s idea, but carry it out in Florence! 

During the year the plan grew to fruition.  The plan was shared with the administration and the other Title I teacher.  Their support and help was key to the success of the project.  A grant of $1,000 was secured from Western Lane Foundation.  The money was used to purchase books, snacks, and certificates for ice cream and books at the local bookstore.  Contact was made with Food For Lane County and permission was given to work along side them at the school.  The Children’s Public Librarian agreed to visit on Thursday and coordinate her summer reading program with the free lunch kids for the duration of her event.  She also introduced us to Scholastic Literacy Partnership where books could be purchased at a lower cost.  In addition to the help of the other Title I teacher, Debra Shepard, other volunteers were secured for the times we could not be present.  Announcements were made about our Summer Reading Enrichment Program with letters home to students before school ended, an article in the local newspaper, and an interview on the local radio station.  When the books arrived they were marked with a label “keep or exchange” and loaded into boxes onto a rolling cart from the library.  Other books from our classrooms were offered for exchange.  Bookmarks were made for give-away with the free books.

Our timetable coincided with the free lunch schedule.  We began on June 21 and ended on August 10, 2011, volunteering an hour each Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday from 11:30 to 12:30.  We soon learned because of our location we could not read to the whole group while they ate.  Instead we read to smaller groups each day.  A raffle was held each week for the children to receive a snack, certificate, and sometimes a book from the Literacy Partnership purchase.  $70 of the grant paid for the snacks and certificates.  The first week Scholastic books were given away to each child followed by three other give-aways.  On the other days “Exchange” books were offered for the children to borrow.  We encouraged them to return these books but it was not mandatory.  Our first discovery was that the children did not want to exchange the free books.  They wanted to keep them!  By having the kids write their first and last name on the small sheets of paper for the drawing we were able to identify that we saw 134 children during the summer.  During the four weeks of summer school around 140 lunches were handed out each day, with 2 or 3 children as walk-ins.  For the remainder of the summer 60 to 65 lunches were handed out to Boys and Girls Club kids, with up to 10 walk-ins.  430 books were purchased and sent home with children for a cost of $930.  A count of the used classroom books chosen by children was not kept.  To ensure that the books got home, we had them put their name inside.

What a marvelous experience!  It was a time to connect with kids in a different way and inspire them to read.  The desire to read and talk about books in the first weeks was almost nonexistent, but as time passed the momentum grew.  The children began requesting specific books by series, title, or topic.  They started talking about books and reading during the movie and throughout the afternoon at Boys and Girls Club. 

What’s in the future?  We hope to identify the grade-level of the students, identify their end of year and beginning of year ECBM reading score.  We hope this data will reveal less regression of skills over the summer months.  Emotionally and motivationally we know it was a   success!  With the support of the school and community we want to continue this summer reading adventure!

I would like to thank Western Lane Foundation and their partner Rotary for their support and funding of this project.