It was a successful day at St. Elizabeth Catholic School in Wallaceburg, as the school celebrated family literacy day and also raised funds for their school library.
Elizabeth Gibson, the school’s principal, told the Sydenham Current they brought in guest readers to their classrooms for Camp Read-A-Lot
“We did a school community activity around the book called ‘Something from Nothing’, so every student was able to participate in that,” she said. “We had guest readers… the school board chair John Van Heck, we had superintendents of education here today, we had radio personalities, we had newspaper people, we had our board office and we had many parents come in today to do some guest reading as well.”
Gibson added: “We raised about $1,500 in pledges that are going to go into the classroom library. So that money goes right back into the classrooms so the kids are super excited and pumped. It has just been a great community building day.”
Gibson said the students were excited about the event and looked forward to it all week.
“When you first walk into our school there was a tent set up and some lawn chairs and a banner than said ‘Welcome to Camp Read-A-Lot’. We have been promoting this really heavy for the past couple of days with announcements and I have been tweeting out on Twitter,” she said.
“Kids had the opportunity to wear their pjs or camping clothes today. Bring in sleeping bags, their stuffies, and teachers have set up tents in classrooms and the kids are in their sleeping bags as well. They had an opportunity to do a lot of reading today. So it has been very positive and a great reaction. Plus, what is a camping day without s’mores?”
Gibson said they wanted to promote reading activities with the event and the fact that reading doesn’t have to mean sitting down with an 800 page novel.
“It can be the sports score, it could be the newspaper, it can be online reading, it could be about the Mine Craft books, Googling and reading about how to fix the problem with your iPad. Reading is reading. It doesn’t matter what form or medium it is in. It’s reading and different purposes,” she said.
“Basically the big idea is the need to read and it can be done in a fun way but there is definitely a need to read and try to engage families because we know when families are promoting literacy at home, it helps out the students. It’s a huge indicator of student success down the road.”
Gibson said it was nice to have senior administration with the St. Clair Catholic District School Board in to participate in the event.
“They love coming into the school when the schedule permits because ultimately they are teachers, just with additional responsibilities,” she said.
Gibson said it was a great opportunity for the kids to have different community members in to visit as well.
“They were asking some of them questions, ‘how did you get to be a radio host?’ or ‘what do you need to do to be a journalist?’. Having the parents in, they get to see their child’s school environment and classroom environment and make them feel welcome to come because really education is about a partnership between home and school.”
Here are some submitted photos from the day:
