Macville School initiates new incentives to promote literacy skills over summer

July 4, 2014 · 0 Comments

By Brittany Spencer
As students of Macville Public School celebrate the successful end of another school year, teachers are developing new ways to better prepare them for continued success come September.
Macville has initiated a brand new Summer Reading Program for its students, intended to encourage them to continue reading throughout the summer and remain engaged with the literacy skills that they have practised throughout the academic year.
Over the last two weeks of classes, students and teachers participated in a scholastic book fair, from which each student from Grades 1 to 7 chose, or was assigned, a book based on their own personal reading level and interest. The books were paid for with money the program collected through fundraising efforts and were sent home with students free of charge.
The program also includes an incentive for kindergarten students, who will receive two free issues of Owl Kids Chirp Magazine throughout the summer, due to an agreement the school made with the publisher.
Macville teacher Karen Dallow, initiator of the program, outlined the details and goals of the summer’s reading initiative.
“The overall goal is to promote reading over the summer in order to reduce a gap in reading when students return in September,” she explained.
The program is intended to encourage students to exercise and maintain their reading skills outside of a classroom setting, she added.
In addition to a book, students will also receive a pre-addressed post card to Macville Public School, upon which they can scribe their thoughts and impressions of their book to be sent back to the school and reviewed in September during the program’s follow-up activities.
The program also includes an online discussion forum to be active throughout the summer, where students can comment on their progress and thoughts as they complete their books. Using the online forum Today’s Meet, teachers can create a discussion board under a private domain accessible only to students, where they can post questions concerning plot, characters, and themes that students can respond to in real time.
Dallow explained that the program will extend into the start up of September’s new term and each student will complete a culminating activity, such as a book review or presentation project, to bring together and showcase the reading they did over the summer for their teachers and fellow students.