Molly Lou Melon

Preschool and Kindergarten Book Reviews

by Book Reviews and Recommendations

Stand TallMolly Lou Melon, Molly Lou Melon by Patty Lovell and illustrated by David Catrow. Molly Lou is the shortest kid in first grade and has big buck teeth. Her grandmother tells her to stand tall and smile big. Fun, cute, whimsical illustrations make a nice lesson, but a nicer story.

— Dawn Miller, RAWV Advisory Board

Memoirs of a GoldfishMemoirs of a Goldfish by Devin Scillian and illustrated by Tim Bowers. Help! A goldfish is not happy with a snail, a crab and a couple of guppies invade his personal space.

Scaredy SquirrelScaredy Squirrel by Melanie Watt. Scaredy Squirrel sticks to his tree, the better to stay away from scary things like tarantulas, Martians and germs, until he is literally drawn out of his home for a glide around the forest.

The Relatives CameThe Relatives Came by Cynthia Rylant. It is amazing how cozy and happy everyone can be when they squeeze into a little house to make room for visiting relatives.

The Dandelion SeedThe Dandelion Seed by Joseph P. Anthony and Cris Arbo. In honor of the West Virginia Dandelion Festival in White Sulphur Springs, here is a book about a last, lonely seed who finally lets go to fly on the cold autumn wind.

Miss Bindergarten Gets ReadyMiss Bindergarten Gets Ready for Kindergarten by Joseph Slate. It’s an alphabet book, but also a rhyming look at all the things children do to get ready for school in the morning and everything the teacher does to get ready for her students. You can read it for the rhyming fun, or for the reassuring peek at what kindergarten will look like.

— Dawn Miller, RAWV Advisory Board

Stinky Smelly FeetStinky Smelly Feet: A Love Story by Margie Palatini. Douglas and Dolores are ducks, and they are smitten, but someone has stinky webbed feet. How embarrassing! Will love prevail? This story has lots of kid appeal.

Most of this author’s picture books can be used as read aloud titles for this age group.

— Raleigh County Read Aloud

Odd VelvetOdd Velvet by Mary Burg Whitcomb. Great for children entering kindergarten through first or second grade. It tells the story of Velvet, who seems strange to her classmates at first, but they gradually learn that being different is not necessarily bad. A very warm story beautifully illustrated by Tara Calahan King.

— Dawn Miller, RAWV Advisory Board

Axle AnnieAxle Annie by Robin Pulver. No matter how hard it snows, Axle Annie will get the students to school and home again.

Calico the Wonder HorseCalico the Wonder Horse by Virginia Lee Burton. Is it a comic book? Is it a Western? It is definitely an original tale of good and evil.

— Raleigh County Read Aloud

Dog BreathDog Breath by Dav Pilkey. Even skunks avoid Hally, her breath is that bad. Full of heavy-handed humor and puns that kids love.

Day the Crayons Quit

The Day the Crayons Quit by Drew Daywalt. Full of color and imagination, this tale transports children into the world of their crayons, where they learn a little creativity can often be a very satisfying solution.

About our contributors:

Terri McDougal is director of children’s services at the Kanawha County Public Library and a board member of Read Aloud West Virginia.

Dawn Miller is editorial page editor of the The Charleston Gazette-Mail, a 20-year Read Aloud West Virginia volunteer, and a former chair of Read Aloud’s board.

New Read Aloud chapters launch with start of 2015-2016 school year

by ChaptersNews

Five additional chapters join Read Aloud West Virginia for the 2015-2016 school year, bringing the organization’s reach to 30 of West Virginia’s 55 counties.

Volunteers have been organizing chapter boards and recruiting new readers for classrooms in Hampshire, Hardy, Jackson, Logan and Mason counties in anticipation of the launches.

For information about volunteer reader orientation sessions in these or any of Read Aloud’s participating counties, visit our website at www.readaloudwestvirginia.org.

Welcome and thank you, new volunteers!

A Long Walk to Water

Book, reader inspire Greenbrier students to take action

by BooksNewsVolunteer Readers

By Nikki Moses

When Kim Curry read A Long Walk to Water to students at Eastern Greenbrier Middle School, she set off a chain of events that culminated in a highly successful drive for backpacks and school supplies for kids in Haiti.

A Long Walk to Water by Linda Sue Park is a true story about Salva, a Sudanese lost boy, and a fictional girl, Nya. Nya cannot attend school because she must spend her days carrying water from a far away pond for her family. Author Park brings their lives together when Salva helps build a well in Nya’s village, thus enabling her to attend school.

Curry had witnessed the same water problems in Haiti, where she has traveled six times through Mountains to Mountains, a program of Trinity A Long Walk to WaterUnited Methodist Church in Ronceverte.

“That has been my experience in Haiti,” she said. “Some children can’t go to school because they have to carry water.”

Curry said she “took photographs of community wells, water jugs, people carrying water, on my trip in March with the purpose of sharing them with the students because I had read A Long Walk to Water to them.” Seeing this lack of access to clean water in Haiti (like in Sudan), along with class discussions, inspired Greenbrier students to help Haitian kids by conducting the backpack drive. Soon students at Greenbrier East High School became involved.

Curry said, “Brindi Anderson did the legwork for the drive. She provided all of the structure the kids needed. I just read the book. The kids jumped in and Brindi provided guidance.” Anderson is a teacher at Eastern Greenbrier Middle School.

The students needed money for shipping costs, so they held three-point basketball competitions, bake sales and more. They raised more than $130 and sent the supplies to Ecole-Shalome School in Croix des Bouquets outside of Port-au-Prince.

Curry, who is a retired teacher and school principal, and a Read Aloud coordinator and reader, hopes to further the relationship between students at the two schools through Skype, letter writing and emailing.

Teamwork puts books in homes of Tucker County students

by Book DistributionEventsNews

Kindergarten students at Tucker Valley Elementary/Middle School received book shelves and books for their homes at the school’s year-end picnic.

Read Aloud chapter coordinator Tracy Harlan partnered with Janice Brady of West Virginia Children’s Home to the benefit of both organizations.

“I donated 100 teen books to WVCH and in turn, Mr. Mike Mason, woodworking instructor, and a team of students worked on building the shelves,” said Harlan.

“It was an amazing result,” she continued. “We got the shelves we needed and [Brady] created a mobile lab for her students to use to check out books. It was a win-win for all!”

NGK supports Read Aloud, local communities

by DonorsNewsSupportersUncategorized

NGK Spark Plugs (U.S.A.), Inc. recently announced they will become a corporate sponsor of Read Aloud West Virginia. A $3,000 contribution in 2015 is the first in what is anticipated to be a multi-year partnership.

The company joins ECA and BrickStreet as ongoing sponsors.

“NGK is proud to partner with Read Aloud West Virginia in an effort to increase reading capability in our schools,” said NGK Senior Vice President of Manufacturing Bob Pepper.

“High education standards are critical to the success of our state,” Pepper continued, “and Read Aloud WV’s program is vital to that effort.”

Read Aloud Executive Director Mary Kay Bond noted the donation is both a show of support for Read Aloud and a clear indicator of the company’s dedication to the well-being of West Virginia’s communities.

“NGK’s corporate partnership enables us to continue our efforts to build program consistency around the state. It also underscores the company’s commitment to the citizens of West Virginia,” noted Bond.

Read Aloud WV is very grateful to NGK for their vote of confidence.

 

Family honors patriarch’s love of reading, golf

by DonorsNewsSupporters

The Paul Fox Memorial Foundation has given Read Aloud West Virginia $4,000, which the Fox family raised at its Memorial Golf Tournament in May. The family started the event in memory of Paul Fox, who was an avid golfer. He also was an avid reader, a trait that influenced future generations of the Fox family and ultimately resulted in their gift to Read Aloud.

The event attracted 112 players. BrickStreet was the lead sponsor.

Son-in-law David Walker explained, “Paul was an avid golfer. He got me into golf. He also was an avid reader. He was not a college person, but he was an unbelievable reader. It rubbed off on my girls. My oldest daughter Kinsey went into philosophy (an area of strong interest for Fox.)” She joined Teach for America and now is pursuing a degree in education policy at Vanderbilt University.

Walker, who has a degree in education, read aloud in his daughters’ classrooms for 10 or 12 years at Richmond Elementary in Charleston, and he is occasionally asked back to read even now. The teachers need men to serve as reading role models, he said.

Walker’s wife, Kathleen, and daughters Kinsey and Karley all have been volunteer readers and attended Seuss-A-Palooza events at BrickStreet, where Walker is employed as a safety and loss consultant, and then Read-A-Palooza at Paterno’s at the Park in Charleston.

That exposure led Kinsey to ask her father, “Why don’t we make a donation to Read Aloud West Virginia?” which they did.

The importance of a strong grandparent-parent-child connection exemplified by the Fox-Walker family is one that Read Aloud emphasizes through its parent education program, Director Mary Kay Bond said. Parents and grandparents remain the primary influence in creating lifelong readers.

“That is a crucial link,” she said. She plans to expand Read Aloud’s efforts in this area with physicians and the WIC (Women, Infants and Children) program.

“The Fox contribution is an incredible gift,” Bond said. “It gives us flexibility to more easily tailor programs to chapter needs.”

Hollowell helps Read Aloud partner with Greenbrier Campaign for Grade Level Reading

by NewsSupporters

By Lynn Lewis Kessler

The Hollowell Foundation, a Greenbrier County-based philanthropy, recently awarded a $3,000 grant to Read Aloud West Virginia. The grant provides partial funding to initiate a program designed to reduce summer reading loss.

Read Aloud, a partner in Greenbrier County Schools’ Campaign for Grade Level Reading, plans to offer a program that allows students at Crichton Elementary to self-select paperback books to read throughout the summer. The program is based on a study conducted by Richard Allington and Anne McGill-Franzen. The three-year study provided self-selected, high-interest material for students to read during the summer months and found those students engaged more often in voluntary summer reading and had significantly higher reading achievement than a control group.

The Campaign for Grade Level Reading is a collaborative effort by foundations, non-profit partners, states and communities across the nation to ensure that more children in low-income families succeed in school and graduate prepared for college, a career and active citizenship, according to Nancy Hanna, Director of Early Childhood Education for Greenbrier County Schools.

“Greenbrier County Schools is thrilled to have Read Aloud West Virginia as one of its partners,” said Hanna. “Engaged communities mobilized to remove barriers, expand opportunities, and assist parents in fulfilling their roles and responsibilities to serve as full partners in the success of their children are needed to assure student success.”

The Hollowell Foundation honors the philanthropic efforts of Otto and Margaret Ford Hollowell by supporting projects that sustain and advance educational, scientific, literary, recreational and cultural endeavors throughout the Greenbrier Valley.

“The Hollowell Foundation is very pleased to support Read Aloud West Virginia,” said the Foundation’s Executive Director Sherry Ferrell. “Their educational programming is very important to the students in our area and helps us achieve our mission of enhancing the quality of life in Greenbrier County.”

Read Aloud will work throughout the school year to secure additional local funding, which will enable the program to be offered to all grades at Crichton beginning in May 2016.

 

Illustrator to Visit Summers County July 11

by Uncategorized

‘John Henry’ illustrator to visit Summers County

TALCOTT, W.Va., June 15, 2015 — Illustrator Peter Thornton will visit West Virginia to bring the tale of John Henry to life once more at John Henry Days in Summers County.

A reading of “A Natural Man, the True Story of John Henry” is set to follow the grand parade on July 11 in Talcott.

Thornton worked with narrator Steve Sanfield to create this retelling of the story of West Virginia’s steel-driving man. Learn more and buy the book here

For more information about Thornton and his art and illustrations, visit him on Facebook.

John Henry Days celebrates its 20th anniversary this year. The three day festival begins with live music on Friday, July 10 and runs through Sunday, July 12, 2015. See the full schedule here.

Help Read Aloud West Virginia bring $25K to the Mountain State

by NewsSocial Media

(CHARLESTON, WV) May 14, 2015 – Read Aloud West Virginia has been selected by the State Farm Youth Advisory Board (YAB) as a top 200 cause in the nation in the 2015 State Farm Neighborhood Assist Program. From May 14 to June 3, the Facebook community will vote for their favorite causes. The 40 causes with the most votes will each be awarded $25,000.

To support Read Aloud West Virginia and vote, visit the State Farm Neighborhood Assist app at https://www.state-assist.com/cause/1504325/read-aloud-west-virginia. Individuals can vote 10 times a day with one easy Facebook visit. You can also help bring these funds to West Virginia by spreading the word to family and friends.

Read Aloud’s mission is to change the literacy culture in West Virginia by keeping books in the hands and on the minds of our state’s children. In support of that mission, the organization offers programs in four primary areas: Volunteer Readers, Public Education, Book Distribution and Classroom Enrichment. Read Aloud currently serves chapters in 25 counties in West Virginia. Funds from the State Farm Neighborhood Assist program would allow the organization to continue to expand to serve more West Virginia students and families.

To learn more about Read Aloud West Virginia or get involved, visit www.readaloudwestvirginia.org, call (304)345-5212 or e-mail readaloud@frontier.com.

State Farm Neighborhood Assist is a crowd-sourced philanthropic initiative that lets communities determine where grant funding is awarded. The initiative used the State Farm Youth Advisory Board to vet submissions and allows Facebook users who download the State Farm Neighborhood Assist application to vote for the final 40 grant winners. The program has been inspired by the incredible number of neighborhoods that are coming together to solve a problem or improve their community.