A Community Celebration of Literacy

We traditionally send students to school so they can learn to read, write and do arithmetic. But rarely do we stop and examine “What is the real value of reading?” Of course, reading enables our students to grow up and pursue careers in their chosen fields of interest. However, here at Parker we believe that reading has more intrinsic value than as just a means to an end. Reading enriches our students’ lives in the here and now by developing their language skills, exposing them to new worlds and ideas, and letting their imaginations run wild. That is why, every year, we chose to celebrate our students’ love of reading with our annual Read Across America Day.

Read Across America Day is a true celebration of literacy. Our morning starts with lively greetings all around and much excitement about what costumes each child is wearing. Students delight in seeing the clever and artful costumes that their peers have pulled together. The joy becomes intergenerational as our youngest students join with their older buddies, and together we all participate in a costume parade! Afterwards, our buddies meet in the lower school classrooms, and students get right down to business sharing favorite books.

Throughout the day, various classes also participate in their own, unique celebrations of literacy. We were also treated to a sneak peak of our upcoming musical “Into the Woods” as all our 8th graders dressed in costume for the day, making a tremendous splash at our parade. Our 3-4s in Nari’s classroom began a literal “Read Across America” journey, with the goal of enjoying literature featuring every state you would cross in a transcontinental trip. Students also enjoyed visits from working authors and literacy professionals.

Alexis Sky, a writing professor at Russell Sage and the manager of The Little Bookhouse at Stuyvesant Plaza visited and shared “book talks” with the whole middle school. First-time local children’s book author, Farial English, visited our lower school students to share her book and discuss the writing and publishing processes. Finally James Bruchac, an author, storyteller, and cultural and wilderness educator, presented engaging story-telling sessions for our PreK, Lower School, and Middle School students. James stories included various Native legends, Adirondack tall tales, and animal interactions combined with some of his own, often comical, life experiences.

RAAD is a highlight of the year for students but it is only one aspect of Parker’s rich language arts curriculum. Our school culture cultivates active readers, writers, listeners and speakers. Beginning in Pre K, our students develop an identity as readers and writers as they practice journaling, participate in frequent read-alouds, and benefit from an emergent curriculum built around literacy-based themes. By the time our students reach Kindergarten, we are prepared and invested in supporting their academic journey as readers.

Our Kindergarten teacher, Julia Cadieux, explains, “Kindergarten is such an exciting time for literacy! I love watching my students connect the dots between letters, sounds, and words. Our classroom engages children in a variety of ways; whether that’s using direct phonics instruction, games, songs, rhymes and verses, or read-out louds. Kindergarten embeds language and literacy skills into all of our play and projects which allows children to do what they do best – learn through doing!” Debbie Hoffman, a Parker 1-2 teacher, elaborates further, “No matter what subject or grade you teach, as a teacher, every teacher is a reading teacher. In all subjects and grades, children need to be able to “decode” words (actually figure out each word) and also understand the message behind the words (comprehension).”

Debbie goes on to explain, “The recent focus on the Science of Reading directly affects the lower school teachers at Parker. As a progressive school, staying true to our mission means keeping up with current research and best practices in teaching. To that end, this year Parker K-2nd grade teachers have begun to pilot components of a well-known, science-of-reading phonics program called Fundations. This program strongly aligns with the science of reading because it provides a systematic approach to phonics instruction and engages a variety of learning modalities; it also teaches and reinforces foundational handwriting and spelling skills. All of that said, phonics is just ONE component of literacy. The beauty of Parker literacy instruction is that we have the time, resources, and professional experience to employ a holistic approach. While we utilize best practices like the Science of Reading, we also strive to ensure that we are capturing the joy and authentic use of literacy far beyond this one curriculum.”

As our students grow, the opportunities for engaging literacy work expand exponentially. Nari Gottlieb, one of Parker’s 3-4 teachers, shares, “Literature circles are magic in 3-4’s! These small, book club style groups come together and explore a text in a way that goes deeper than they have before. It feels almost like a culmination of all the literacy work they have done thus far, and yet it is just the beginning! Learners are pulling apart the text, reflecting, debating, reading independently and through a shared experience. In just this one piece of literacy, children naturally strengthen their comprehension and critical thinking skills, and equally as important, their love of learning!”

Our dedication to literacy at Parker extends all the way through our 8th grade curriculum. Emily Brocks, our middle school ELA teacher, expounds, “In middle school, our students are experienced readers. We continue to build our comfort with reading, with our focus shifting from decoding words to unpacking layers of meaning. We read widely across genres, from poetry, drama, informational texts, and essays to historical fiction, realistic fiction, fantasy, and mythology. With each text that we encounter, we think about the information communicated, as well as the author’s purpose, themes, and character development. We practice close reading and think about explicit and subtextual meanings.We ask questions, and go back to our text to find answers. Over the course of middle school, we build strong analytical skills that are transferable to every discipline. At the same time, ELA is a space for working actively to build vocabulary, and we find new words in our readings, as well as in weekly vocabulary work.We weave together our vocabulary and analytical skills in our writing, building skills of stating and supporting arguments, and reflecting on what we read.”

No matter the age or the grade, community-wide celebrations like these unite our students in pursuit, passion, and play. Everyone will be ready for a good bedtime story tonight!