WE LOVE READING!! The excitement of finding a book on the shelf. The smell of a book when you flip the pages. The adventure that awaits ahead. WE LOVE READING!

Literacy in Elementary School

As educators, we strive to promote our love of reading to all students. We want to show them the wonderful world of adventure and fantasy. We want to show them the importance of learning facts and adding to our knowledge about topics of interest.

AIS took an enormous leap forward in literacy by adopting the Reader’s Workshop model in 2013. The program is now well established and we are proud of the outcomes for students. In 2017, we followed it up with the fantastic addition of the 117SPA-a space for Social, Personal and Applied learning, a quiet place for reading, and the place to access our library collection, numbering 10,000 titles. Elementary students at AIS are given the opportunity to love reading and become a strong, skilled, lifelong reader.

Literacy Week 2018

Every year, the Literacy Week team collaborates to plan a week full of engaging events and activities for ES students. Events such as a whole-school read aloud, author visits, a book character talk show, and a students-versus-teachers Battle of the Books competition were well received by students.

Literacy Week kicked off with a spectacular whole school read aloud of They All Saw A Cat written by Brendan Wenzel. Students were treated to a visually stunning performance which brought the book characters to life. Students received the annual Literacy Week button and were challenged to reach a collaborative reading goal of 100,000 minutes.

During Literacy Week…

• Students were visited by local children’s authors, Ellen Leou and Christina Matula.
• Grade 1 and Grade 2 students participated in an interactive Character Talk Show.
• Grade 4 students participated in a students-versus-teachers Battle of the Books tournament.

Around campus…

• “Guess the Reader” posters were posted on the 119 hall windows.
• Students took pictures of themselves with their favorite books.
• Mystery readers visited classrooms to read aloud their favorite story.

Ending the week…

Literacy week ended with the Book Character Parade, an event our students look forward to each year. Children dress up as a character from their favorite work of literature. Parents fill the 119 hall to see all the different costumes. They are especially excited to see our ES teachers’ costume creations. This year, there was an abundance of grade-level team costumes from popular books.

Reading Goal

For the past two years, the literacy team issued a challenge to all the students in the ES and EC division to reach a collaborative reading goal of 100,000 minutes.  To support the reading goal, teachers agreed to receive a pie in their face from students if they were able to reach 100,000 minutes. The students exceeded it by 23,911 minutes.

Success

We would like to congratulate Mr. Matthew Hong, Mr. Allen Lee, Ms. Althea Landrum, Mr. Matthew Wise, Ms. Angel Ka, Ms. Hilary Dysart, Ms. Sarah Brandt, Ms.Katie DeSantis, Ms. Kelly Chong, and Ms. Amber Stice for organizing an amazing Literacy Week. The hard work and collaboration on all the events and projects paid off. The smiles, cheers, and laughter of the students were priceless. We cannot wait for what is in store for next year!