Reading Fun at Bradley Elementary School

On Friday February 28th, students at Bradley Elementary School in San Bernardino took part in events celebrating Dr. Seuss’s birthday. The day was filled with a comic ventriloquist who came with his friends, green eggs and ham, free books, and volunteers from Arroyo Valley High School’s Teaching Academy who read Dr. Seuss books to the students. The students were filled with excitement as they filed into the auditorium, some in their pajamas. Mr. Joe, was ready with his animal puppet friends including an elephant who squirted water from his trunk and dragon who had smoke come out of his nostrils. The students were entertained and interacted with him throughout the show. Two students went up in front to take part in a ventriloquist demonstration. Mr. Joe’s goal was to excite kids about reading and told them, “each time you read, you get smarter.” He used examples students could get excited about such as, Transformers, Iron Man, Star Wars, and ET to explain that reading can be more fun than watching a movie or cartoon. Sixth grader, Ruby Lopez shared her thoughts on the assembly saying, "my favorite thing was when he was using the puppets, it was funny when he told jokes.” Program Facilitator of Intervention and Technology, Jennifer Bay helped plan this event for the students. When asked why this was important, she said, “to get the kids excited about reading. Lots of these kids don’t have books at home and we want to tell them Dr. Seuss is exciting. We’ve been doing small activities throughout the week and wanted them to be excited about reading this week; we wanted them to celebrate an interest in anything that has to do with literature.” A book fair with a special section devoted to Dr. Seuss was there for students to purchase books. Students also took accelerated reading tests in the computer lab, if they passed with an 80, they could pick out a prize from a selection of stuffed animals, toys, and more. In the special day class, students were busy rolling out green play-do. At the end of the day, each student was given a book by their teacher to encourages to read at home. Bilingual support teacher Joanna McCray, shared, “some will be motivated to read more than they do, and the ones who already read will continue to read all the time, if we pull them in by their interests, it will get them to read.” After a busy day eating green eggs and ham, hearing books being read to them, and walking away with a new book, students left with the knowledge that reading is fun, and Dr. Seuss is one cool cat.