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Neighbors | Abby Slanker.Canfield Local School District Literacy Coach Carol Young, in keeping with the story book theme, dressed as Cinderella and addressed parents and students at C.H. Campbell Elementary School’s family literacy night on Jan. 8.
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Neighbors | Abby Slanker.C.H. Campbell Elementary School kindergartners played a rhyming matching game in their classroom during the school’s family literacy night.
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Neighbors | Abby Slanker.C.H. Campbell Elementary School second-grade teacher John DiRenzo discussed a book with his students and their parents in his classroom during the school’s family literacy night on Jan. 8.
By ABBY SLANKER
The Canfield Local School District hosted a family literacy night for families at C.H. Campbell Elementary School on Jan. 8.
The story book theme for the event was prevalent throughout the school, with several teachers and students dressed in costume.
The evening began with an informative glimpse into the instructional practices that form the curriculum, followed by a visit to a classroom to allow the parents to engage in hands-on learning experiences with their children to help demonstrate the balanced literacy framework utilized by the teaching staff.
Parents also received a folder with strategies to help their students at home, a list of the top 25 recommended grade level books and newsletters with further information.
C.H. Campbell Elementary School Principal Travis Lavery welcomed the students and their families.
“Good evening, everybody. Thank you for coming out tonight. We have an exciting and fun-filled evening planned. We are going to dig into our literacy curriculum, allowing you a glimpse into what your children do on a daily basis in the classroom. We have many fun activities you can participate in with them in the classrooms tonight,” Lavery said.
Lavery then turned the floor over to Literacy Coach Carol Young, who further explained the events of the evening.
“Good evening and welcome. First, I‘d like to thank you for coming. Second, I‘d like to thank our teachers for coming tonight and taking the time to be here. Also, thank you to the PTA for setting up wonderful decorations for our Story Book theme tonight,” Young said.
Young went on to explain how the students are taught reading comprehension.
“We focus on three questions when it comes to reading comprehension. First, what is within the text? Second, what is beyond the text? And third, we focus on critiquing and analyzing the text. We talk a lot about these three questions in the classroom,” Young said.
After a short video showing conversations with C.H. students, Young dismissed the students and their families to their classrooms to engage in literacy games and experiences in two pre-selected stations.
Stations included, Make-it Take-it, Word Games, Technology and Me, Create a Story, Think it Through Mind Games, Jeopardy and Book Tasting in the library.
The library was set up like a restaurant, complete with reservations, select seating and menus with questions pertaining to the books stacked on the tables. The books were categorized by grade level and genres, such as informational, realistic fiction, fairy tales, fantasy, biography, animal fantasy and folktales.
Young said they looked at all the comments from last year’s family literacy night exit tickets and made a few adjustments for this year.
“We read all the comments from last year and what we saw the most was that parents wanted more time in the classrooms and stations with their children. So, we added more time there. The time spent there is very informative for the parents and the kids love having their parents in their classrooms. Parents in Canfield are incredibly supportive of their children. They come in with a positive attitude, and that effects the way their children think about school. Whether it’s Literacy Night, conferences or homework, adults and children alike are lifelong learners,” Young said.
Lavery said he likes to see the parents armed with the tools and strategies to help their children at home.
“It‘s nice to be able to give the parents the tools to work with their children at home. We do this with Math Night, too. We share with the parents what is happening in the classroom and then they can mirror that at home. We give them strategies to help the children learn. The best part of Family Literacy Night is the parents come in and learn what their children are learning and they can take that home and help them, which is very important,” Lavery said.
Hilltop Elementary School hosted their family literacy night on Jan. 10.