Ladd Acres Elementary School

Hillsboro ELEMENTARY School Volunteer

“Intelligence plus character- that is the goal of education”- Martin Luther King, Jr

WHy VOlunteer in an ELEMENTARY school?

I decided to volunteer at an elementary school because I want to eventually become a teacher. At first, my plan was to teach high school English, but since volunteering, I have found a love for helping these children further their education. I ended up completely changing my career path because through volunteering, I have found what I want to do.

WHat I do

,It just so happens that I volunteer on the craziest and usually the busiest day of the week- Fridays. I am fortunate because no two Fridays look the same and I end up doing different things every time. Some Fridays we have "normal days" where they have their usual set schedule, other Fridays they have parties that they have earned, or something called "family groups" which incorporates the whole school and I end up seeing kids from a bunch of different grades. But no matter the day, I usually will always help out with grading, lessons, and I even will help answer kids questions. Since I have been there all year, and not just this term, I have been able to build relationships with these kids and they are starting to trust me and see me as another "teacher", which is pretty amazing for me.

My Project

Earlier this year, I was approached by the teacher to fill in a blank bulletin board with something fun. Originally, we were thinking about doing something that would display like their art work or just some sort of activity that they had done. Like most people, I turned to Pinterest, to become inspired. I saw this amazing and fun PAC MAN bulletin board that got the kids into reading. It is basically the layout of PACMAN and then there are a bunch of blank white circles that PACMAN is eating. And in those circles the kids will write different books they have read, and the title says, “Gobbling up books.” I would love to take credit for this, but it was all Pinterest. But I am making some minor adjustments to make it more educational for the kids.

To go along with the cute bulletin board, the children will have multiple opportunities to read different books and then put their review up for other kids to see. It’s a fun idea because it looks like Pac-Man is eating the books, but it also is getting the kids to read. More importantly, they are excited to read and excited to put their books on display. I am also meeting with the kids to make sure the books are appropriate for the child’s reading age, thus meaning, that a book isn’t too easy or too hard for a child. I will also be checking for comprehension and making sure they are getting the most of each book they read.

how it works

Each child will pick out a book, and we set perimeters so the children will pick out books that are appropriate for their age and their own skill. Then after the child reads the book, they will fill out one of these pink sheets. This sheet includes Title, Author, Number of pages, Date started, Date ended, Summary, Rating and I am actually able to figure out a lot about each child just from these categroies. After the children finish their book and their summary, they turn it into us and then I will have the opportunity to look over their summaries and decided what each child needs to work on. For some, its as simple as they chose a book that was lower than their reading level, so it was far too easy. I would suggest that they try and find a book between x amount of pages and x amount of pages. For others, its going over summaries and suggesting things they could add. I will also be checking for comprehension and making sure they are getting the most out of each book they read. I will have them tell me their favorite part, their least favorite, what character look like, etc.

Results so far

I am pleased to say that it has been going so very well so far. Since this is a project that will go through the rest of the year, we are still very new to it. We just had the kids turn in their first round of books on February 28th and I have already found and learned so much. I am still working on talking to everyone, but these are some of the things I was able to work on with the kids.

They are thinking critically about what they read

I am able to recongnize this because the children are asked to rate their book from 1-5. Surprisingly, a lot are not giving all fives which tells me that they are thinking critically about what they read. When I meet with them, I always ask them why they gave the rating that they did and here are just a few of the comments I have received, "I give this novel a rating of 4 1/2 because the book started off kind of slow, but then it got really good and intense", "I give this novel a rating of 5 because it was very interesting and very diverse", and finally "I give this novel a rating of 2 because the words were very small and the book was not very good at all." This is exciting for me to see because then we can have discussions about why they felt this way and what might be a better book choice the next time.

Most are summarizing correctly, but not all

One thing I really love about this project is that it gives the kids an oppurunity to tell someone about something they have read, but we are taking it a step further by having them write out their summary. I am constantly impressed with some of their writing and summarizing skills, but I am also excited because I am able to give attention to the kids who need more help with those skills. I have the children read their summaries to me aloud and just by doing that, the kids realize the details that they have missed or things that aren't as important as others, so they know what they can take away or add.

Some are already on their second and third book

We made it clear from the beginning that this wasn't a competition but something that gives the kids an opportunity to tell not only me about the books they have read, but to also share it with their fellow classmates and the school. Its just really great to see so many kids take this activity and to become more serious about reading.

reflection

Though this class is coming to an end, I still plan on finishing this school year with the kids. I plan on continuing this project and volunteering within this class. This whole experience has been so rewarding for me, but I think the best part was being able to help these kids and give them the opportunity to talk to someone about something they liked or didn't like. But most importantly it gave the kids a reason and an opportunity to just read a book.

“The more that you read, the more things you will know. The more that you learn, the more places you'll go.” - Dr. Seuss