Chicago Heights School District 170's Garfield School recently celebrated its third year of collaboration with the Illinois Reading Council by hosting a "Ready, Set … Grow with a Great Story" Parent Academy Literacy/STEM event.
A Literacy Support Grant from the Illinois Reading Council provided funding for the year-long programming.
The family activity was the second of three literacy and STEM-focused events to be held during the 2018-19 school year at Garfield School and was designed as an enrichment component to Kindergarten through 4th-grade classroom-guided instruction while working in conjunction with the district's Parent Academy Program.
According to Jennifer Gorton, the Parent Academy Director, the primary goal of this "Ready, Set … Grow with a Great Story!" literacy initiative is to provide kindergarten through fourth-grade students and their families with comprehensive, standards-based literacy instruction that highlights growth mindset practices along with purposeful, hands-on STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Art and Math) learning opportunities through both narrative and informational texts.
"We engage our school community with the opportunity of working with grade-level teaching teams and set high expectations for family participation," Gorton said.
This recent "Ready, Set … Grow with a Great Story" literacy /STEM program highlighted the historical narrative text Pop's Bridge by Eve Bunting, and incorporated a variety of hands-on literacy and STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Math) problem-solving workshop activities.
"Pop's Bridge was chosen as our mentor text because of its rich language, interesting characters, literary themes, and historical events - and the students and families really enjoyed the story!" Reading Specialists, Kelly Scully and Mari Robinette noted.
The "Ready, Set … Grow with a Great Story" event was a great success with more than 50 students and their families attending. All participants left the event with story maps, hand-made binoculars, new books, plus the one-of-a-kind bridge that they planned, built and tested using the STEM design process.
"I don't know who was more excited the parents or the students when it came to creating their bridges," said Garfield School's Media Specialist Margoth Rodriguez.
"I could feel the energy in the room as our students and parents got all their materials and started to collaborate on designing and testing the bridges. The smiles on their faces as they left was proof of a successful night."
"We are proud to continue our efforts with the support of the IRC grant," Gorton said. "The CHSD 170 Parent Academy Program is a family engagement initiative that was designed to empower families with specific grade-level curriculum content, instructional strategies, and learning opportunities that best support a student's continued academic and social growth both at home and in the classroom."
The CHSD170 Parent Academy Program is designed as a monthly in-school workshop that gives parents of students in grades K-4 the opportunity to work closely with their child's classroom teacher. During each session, parents work together with teachers to practice and reinforce new skills and concepts that their child is learning.
"We are thrilled to offer events such as these because they embody the mission statement of the Illinois Reading Council by supporting those who promote and teach lifelong literacy," Gorton concluded.