Launched in 1998 by the National Education Association (NEA) and guided by a committee of educators, NEA’s Read Across America is the nation’s largest celebration of reading. While celebrated the first week of March, this year-round program focuses on motivating children and teens to read through events, partnerships, and reading resources that are about everyone, for everyone. In our schools, Read Across America was celebrated with a week of readers of all ages exploring books and authors, enjoying special guest readers and speakers and participating in schoolwide reading events. Here is a look at some of the highlights of activities that took place in our schools during the weeklong literacy event.
Bullock
Montclair’s mayor, police officers, firefighters, and representatives from the Montclair Public Library, Toni’s Kitchen, Watchung Booksellers, the Montclair History Center, Out Montclair, and AAPI Montclair celebrated “Read Across America Day” at Charles H. Bullock School on Friday, March 8, reading to students in their classrooms.“ This was a fabulous way for our students to connect to important members of their Montclair community and celebrate reading,” said Bullock Principal Nami Kuwabara.“This event was organized by Bullock third grade teachers Jessica Dehn and Jessica Little,” said Kuwabara. “Thanks to their vision and hard work, ‘Read Across America Day’ at Bullock was a huge success.”
Bradford
Bradford students successfully completed their initial goal of 35,000 minutes read and earned a no homework pass for the whole school. Then they met the second challenge from Principal Frances Aboushi to reach 60,000 minutes to earn an ice cream truck. The grand total for the week of reading was 78,914 minutes! Seventy percent of all Bradford students logged minutes which is an amazing feat! “We are amazed by the energy Read-a-Thon created this year both in and out of the classroom and so appreciate every minute read, every reading session logged, and every fundraising email shared with family and friends,” said Aboushi. “Thank you to everyone for making this a huge success!”
Edgemont
During the week of March 4-8, students at Edgemont Montessori School celebrated Read Across Edgemont once again! Monday through Thursday featured a different book that was read aloud in each classroom by guest readers, including parents and school staff. The titles were selected from the NEA Read Across America 2023-2024 Calendar of recommended books and were generously purchased and distributed by the Edgemont PTA. On Friday, Read Across Edgemont culminated in a visit from author Denise Lewis Patrick. Her most recent book,
Justice Ketanji was just one of the books she discussed while visiting each grade level. Each grade read one of six of her books in preparation for the visit. Lewis answered questions, signed books, and posed for pictures as the students remarked about their favorite settings, characters, chapters and now their favorite author.
Nishuane
Nishuane continues its literacy outreach project, “Pennies for Pages” in which students will read and raise funds for the Montclair Public Library. Pennies for Pages began on March 4 and ends on May 17. Every book read by a Nishuane student, on his or her own time, together with classmates, or with his or her family will earn 1 pom-pom (1 pom-pom = 1 penny). This includes reading done toward classroom book challenges, but students are welcome to read more. There was a weeklong celebration of reading, “Read-A-Palooza,” taking place during the week of March 4 and a Book Swap for students to donate books from home and take home “new” books.
Northeast
While the country read across America, Northeast hosted a myriad of activities that fostered reading across the school. Whether it be Book Buddies, flashlight reading, interactive story times or a school wide story read by Principal Joseph Putrino, our students had a meaningful and great week!
