Students get reading treat
Published 10:04 pm Monday, October 30, 2017
- Mashayla Falls, a Forest Glen Middle School student, reads with first-graders Arianna Miller and Hannah Thomas at Kilby Shores Elementary School on Monday. A group of Forest Glen students came to the school to read seasonal books with their younger counterparts.
Kindergarten and first-grade classes at Kilby Shores Elementary School got a special treat on Monday, and the trick was that it helped both the young students and some of their older counterparts.
Students from Forest Glen Middle School visited the elementary school, where many of them previously attended, to read books and their own “fractured fairy tale” creations to the younger students.
Middle-school literacy teacher Caren Bueshi said it was a good way for the middle-school students to practice reading fluency while also instilling a love of reading in the younger students.
“I thought if they could practice with books and read to others, that’s going to help with fluency,” Bueshi said.
Middle-school students in the Literacy Foundations class chose seasonal books in advance and thought up questions to ask the younger students based on what they are currently learning in class.
Kindergarten students worked with their older partners to pick out the author’s name on the cover, while first-graders were asked questions about the characters, plot and what they thought would happen next.
Another group of middle-school students wrote “fractured fairy tales” — classic fairy tales revised with strange twists to major plot points — and read them to the students.
Emma Smith, an 11-year-old sixth-grader at Forest Glen Middle School, wrote about the “three mean pigs,” while Lauren Vann, also an 11-year-old sixth-grader at FGMS, wrote about “Sleeping Ugly” rather than Sleeping Beauty.
Both girls said they enjoyed seeing kids they know and their old teachers.
“I used to go here, and my little brother is in Ms. Davis’ class,” Emma said.
Bueshi said the reading partnership is beneficial to the middle-school students as well as the elementary-school ones.
“They were made to practice reading without realizing they were practicing reading,” she said.