My Reading Streak

Hi! I'm Lindsey! Last year when I was in 4th grade, my teacher, Mrs. Hartman, read a couple chapters of The Reading Promise near the end of the school year, to my classmates and I. It was about a girl in 4th grade (just like me!) and her dad that made a promise to read every single night for 100 nights! Once they got that achieved, they made another promise to read for 1,000 nights in a row!

When Mrs. Hartman read just the first and second chapters of that book I got inspired to do that with my mom. So on May 30th, 2012 my mom and I started to read the book: Now You See Me... It was great! It was also part of the Poison Apple series. Since I had the first six books in that series we started reading all of them! Each of the books were between 150-180 pages.

From May 30th to November 21st my mom and I have read the 3rd, 4th, 5th and we are almost done the 6th book of the Poison Apple series! We also have read 172 nights in a row, so far! I remember when my mom and I reached 50 nights in a row! I freaked out!

When my mom and I reached 100 nights I couldn't believe it!  Then came 150 nights! I was so happy I couldn't stay still! My mom and I are now trying to reach 200 nights! I think we can do it! If we complete that we are going to go for how long we can go, and hopefully never stop!

Thank you for reading my short story and hopefully you got inspired too!

The Stay at Home Teacher's Promise: Including the Family

Back in August, I received an email from Mrs. Hartman about Alice Ozma and The Reading Promise.  I found it ironic that I received this note on this particular evening because I had just had an especially wonderful reading time with my then 13 month old son.  One of the stories we read that night was Ten Little Ladybugs. I can remember bringing this book out a few months before and Colin showing little interest.   On this night, however, it was as if the whole book opened up for him. He was mesmerized by the pages, "counting" the ladybugs, and finding them on the page.  As I was putting him down to bed, I actually whispered in his ear how much I cherish all our reading cuddles.  In my moment of joy, my heart ached wishing my husband could take part in this time too. He is active duty Air Force and has been away from home since July and will not return till Christmas. When I received Mrs. Hartman’s email, I had already made several recordings of my husband reading story books to my son.  He also did one of the Hallmark recordable books.  Although I had these recordings I wasn’t consistent with playing them for my son.  

Reading with Daddy at 3 months old

Once I heard about The Reading Promise I knew that mine and my son’s reading promise would be a little different than others.  After several years as a teacher (three of which were at Sinking Springs, go Panthers!) I am now a stay at home mom.  At least for now, reading to my son throughout the day is something we do without even having to think about it.  I don’t think we have missed a day of reading since he was six months old.  My husband, on the other hand, is rarely given this opportunity.  I decided then that our reading promise would be Daddy “reading” at least one story a day to our son.  Starting August 21^st, Colin and I listened to one of Daddy’s stories each day.  We were also fortunate enough to visit Daddy shortly after this where he was able to read in person.  These days are always the best.  Unfortunately, after a few weeks it became apparent that some days Colin didn’t want to listen to Daddy’s story.  Although only a toddler, he is well aware of his Daddy’s absence and it seems the stories are a reminder that he is not here.  

Our reading promise was in need of some adjustments.  Not only is my sweet Colin often separated from his Daddy he’s also hundreds of miles away from his grandparents, aunts, and uncles.  I decided to add all of them to our reading promise.   Now, in order to keep our Streak going, Colin must listen to at least one family member other than Mommy each day.  Just like Alice and her father, Colin listens to the family member just before bed.  I make sure it is the first story we do each night so that I don’t accidentally forget.  He’s not quite old enough to remind me yet.  I have audio and video recordings of family members on my iPhone that we use most often.  On evenings when our schedules align, Daddy reads a story over the phone in real-time, and whenever we are visiting family or they are visiting us Colin will get his story read in person.  

Reading with Pappy as part of the Streak

We have been going strong with the Streak so far. I have to admit that there have been a few nights Colin has had a babysitter or he's fallen asleep in the care late in the evening and we missed our reading promise story. I guess it can't be a Streak with missed nights. I've figured out some solutions like playing one of the recorded stories in the car during those unexpected late nights. Since I can't even remember the date of our last missed night, we will officially call today, November 12, 2012, Day 1 of our Reading Promise Streak. 

How can our reading promise relate to yours?  Perhaps you have a relative far away that you’d like your child to be able to connect with or maybe your child’s father travels for work as well and you’d like him to continue being a part of everyday life at home.  Maybe you have to work late or you’re busy taking care of another child but still want to read to your other child.  

I have lots of hopes and dreams for our reading promise.  I know that it will evolve over the coming years.  I imagine my son writing emails to his grandmother about chapter books they are reading together and listening to stories with ear buds on long car rides.  No matter how our reading promise changes, one thing I know for sure, my son will be read to every day.

Jackie Goodwillie

www.thestayathometeacher.blogspot.com

Day 50: Summitting Mt. Everest

Our classroom reached two exciting milestones this week!! First, we reached one of our mini Reading Streak goals-- 50 consecutive school days!! This goal also coincided with a second amazing accomplishment. We successfully reached the summit of Mount Everest! Let me explain...

Last year, my class was introduced to the topic of Mt. Everest courtesy of one of our favorite class Mystery Readers, Nicholas' mom. She read a book called, To the Top! Climbing the World's Highest Mountain to my class. Immediately, my class became engrossed with the topic of Mt. Everest. They just wanted to devour any and all information about the peak that they could find. As we explored some of the other resources that our school library had to check out about Mt. Everest, we came across a great find on Sinking Springs' library shelves: Worst-Case Scenario, Ultimate Adventure: Everest, You Decide How to Survive! , a choose your own style book where readers are faced with real life decisions on their journey to try to reach the top of Everest. With only one path through the book to successfully reach the summit and return, it takes quite a bit of research, decision making, and thoughtful discussion to accomplish this task successfully. It took our class several unsuccessful tries, but eventually, we made it!

Check out the book trailer for a sneak peek of what adventures we encountered in this book:

Since my class could not get enough of this book last year, I decided to try it again with this year's group of students when I needed a new read aloud book. To help prepare them for their ascent, we started by reading some non-fiction books about Everest to give them some background information.

The Top of the World: Climbing Mount Everest by Steve Jenkins

To the Top! Climbing the World's Highest Mountain by S.A. Kramer

 We also referenced, but didn't fully read, To The Top: The Story of Everest by Steven Venables.

Once my students had learned more about the real life perils on Mount Everest, they were eager to begin their climb. I was pleasantly surprised by the care and thought that they put into their decisions throughout the reading. Sometimes kids think it's fun just to see how many bad decisions they can make to lead themselves to the quickest ending for laughs, but my class didn't! They discussed, debated, used facts and evidence they had gained during our research, had me go back and reread parts of the informational knowledge to hear it again and listen for specific details-- all to make their way to the top. And they did it too! Almost on the first try. (We made it to the top on our first try, but made a tough decision and froze on our way back down the mountain, so we didn't successfully complete the mission, technically.) We nailed it on our second attempt.

 I love sharing choose your own adventure type books with my students because it starts great conversations among students and encourages them to support their opinions with details and evidence from the text. (The teacher in me has to sneak some extra learning in somehow, of course!!)

I typed up this quick worksheet for students to record some of their thinking and practice explaining their thoughts along with supporting evidence in writing. It's free to download if you're interested.

Also, this style of writing help get my students interested in a new type of book that holds their interest. When I went to pick up my students from library last week, the librarian told me suddenly my class just couldn't get enough of choose your own adventure books when it came time to check out books.

If you're not familiar with these types of books, there are a wide variety to check out. Some of the most popular ones can be found at the Choose Your Own Adventure website. It lists all the books in this series (for both younger and older readers alike) sorted by reading level, topic, etc. Another series, You Choose Books, is based on historical events or time periods. There are also even a few more books in The Worst Case Scenario Ultimate Adventure Series: Mars, Amazon, and a new one being released this month (yay!), Deadly Seas. Personally, I love the ones based on real life experiences that can tie fiction and non-fiction together for students and help them make connections in their reading and learning. But, there again, that's the teacher in me talking.

Happy Reading!
Mrs. Hartman

PS- Satellite view and travelers' photographs from some of the Everest Base camp trails are available on Google Maps. Another way to connect your readers to their setting and adventure while adding some geography lessons to the mix as well!!


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It's Never Too Early to Start

Hi everyone, Katie here. I’m a friend of Mrs. Hartman’s, and I’m thrilled to contribute some of my thoughts on reading and reading promises.

I figured out the best way to read to my squirmy-wormy baby: get on his level!

Recently I was talking to a friend about the fact that I love reading books to my 12-week-old son Luke. He seemed a bit surprised, commenting on the fact that Luke is obviously too young to understand the story.

Yes and no, I told him. While Luke may be too young to understand the complex notions of characters and plot development, he can certainly appreciate the brightly-colored pictures, the easy-to-grasp cardboard pages, and the intonation of my voice as I read to him. In fact, these are all vital to his development.

Luke’s mental growth is only part of the reason why I place so much value on reading to him, even as an infant. I also believe that the act of reading books creates a special bond between parent and child. When you’re reading together, you’re also exploring, questioning, and learning together. You’re laughing and crying together. In essence, you’re growing together.

Creating a reading promise is the perfect way to foster such growth. I’m so excited to continue my reading journey with Luke! Tonight we’ll be reading Dear Zoo, a lift-the-flap book by Rod Campbell. It’s one of Luke’s favorites already!

Dear Zoo by Rod Campbell

Guest Post by Katie McLaughlin

Trick-or-READ

When author, Alice Ozma, visited our school a few weeks ago, she mentioned to the students about a tradition that she likes to take part in each Halloween in her hometown neighborhood. It is such a simple, yet powerful idea that gets kids excited about reading and helps to put more books in the hands of children. Even as an adult, I was very tempted to make the drive to New Jersey myself just to check it out. It's called Trick-or-Read.

If you were to visit Alice's father's home on the designated trick or treat evening for Millville, New Jersey, instead of getting a handful of sugary sweets, you would receive a book. Several years ago, Alice proposed the idea of handing out books versus candy to her father and trick-or-read has been happening ever since. This year, with her role as the National Book Fairs' manager of reading programs at Scholastic, her employer heard about her tradition and was eager to help out. Alice was able to place books (and a whole bunch of other fun reading treats) in the hands of hundreds of eager and excited trick-or-readers.

Check out her blog post about the experience on Scholastic's On Our Minds Blog, as well as this New Jersey media site's story of the event.

What an awesome way to get kids to be excited about reading (and less full of sugar)!

Is this something you have done in the past? Anyone planning to try it in the future? What ways do you share your enthusiasm about reading and books? Share your thoughts and ideas!