Grundy County Schools working with Save the Children to promote reading

Save the Children is partnering with Grundy County Schools, for the second year, to offer four KinderBoost® camps this summer at Coalmont, Tracy, North and Pelham. Starting kindergarten is a big milestone, and KinderBoost® helps kids and families with the transition. It is a two week, ten-day readiness program designed to provide children and families opportunities to become familiar with their new school environment, meet school staff, make new friends and engage in early learning activities.

This fall, Save the Children will provide funding, materials, and training for ONE Reading Ambassador to implement the READ (Read Everywhere and Daily) project at North Elementary. This specific READ project provides reading support to teachers, shares best practices, provides training & technical assistance to teachers, and provides in-depth analysis of literacy reports (STAR, AR, my ON). This whole school approach provides the chance for all students to read during the school-day and strengthens family engagement by providing resources and activities for families to do at home. A daily, consistent time for independent reading using ‘just right’ self-selected fiction and nonfiction provides children with a wonderful and enjoyable opportunity to grow as readers that transfers their newly honed skills to other subjects and classes. It benefits children who are above average, on average and below average readers. There is a great deal of research available that states providing increased time for independent reading, with ‘just right’ self-selected books, is one of the best activities for increasing reading achievement with elementary-aged students. The differences in the volume of reading for higher and lower achieving readers has been well documented.