4th-grader breaks book record

By Denise Dick

The Stadium Drive pupil read 267 books this year.

BOARDMAN — Nine-year-old Caitlin Currier rattles off the numeric values of the books she’s read the way most kids run down their best video game scores.

“Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix”? That’s 44 points. “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows” counts for 37 points while “Little Women” is 33.

“I like just about all books,” the Stadium Drive Elementary School fourth-grader said.

Caitlin shattered her school’s record in the accelerated reading program, racking up more than 815 points from the 267 books she read this year.

The previous record, set during the 2001-02 school year, was 711.

“I knew what the record was and I had it in mind, but I really just like to read, too,” Caitlin said.

Pupils read books and then answer test questions to gauge their reading comprehension.

The computer program assesses points based on the length of the book, its difficulty and how well the pupil answers the questions.

“Basically, it’s to encourage reading and to improve comprehension,” Ginny Yazbek, Caitlin’s teacher said of the program’s aim.

The record-breaking reader began her quest before the school year began, chalking up several good reads last summer, her teacher said.

Caitlin doesn’t have a favorite book but lists adventure and mystery as her favorite genres.

A chart near the school’s entrance lists the top readers since the program started in the late 1990s.

“Most of my class is on here,” Caitlin said, pointing to several names on the chart.

Each grade level participates in the accelerated reading program with books aimed for respective ages.

Principal Jim Goske likes that the program encourages reading and the school builds upon that. He reads the names of those pupils who earn 100 points during morning announcements and students earn prizes for their accomplishments.

One day last week, Caitlin, the daughter of Zachary and Cara Currier, wore her accelerated reading T-shirt she earned last year with a button boasting her point total pinned to her chest.

Pupils also participate by developing test questions for books they’ve previously read.

“It takes it to a next level,” Yazbek said.

Although the California school Caitlin attended before enrolling at Stadium Drive two years ago also offered the accelerated reading program, it didn’t get the same emphasis as the Stadium program, Cara Currier said.

Caitlin always enjoyed reading, her mother said, but coming to Stadium intensified it.

Even when she attends middle school next year and there won’t be points and prizes for books, the soon-to-be fifth-grader says she’ll keep reading.

“I just really love to read,” she said.

But sometimes, Caitlin’s joy of reading has to be kept in check both at home and at school. Her mom says it often takes more than one call to dinner to coax her daughter’s nose out of a book.

School personnel keep an eye on her, too.

“When she’s walking into the building in the morning, I have to make sure she doesn’t run into anything because she’s got her head down in a book,” Goske said.