Richmond, Virginia, Friday, March 1,2019. Upsilon Nu Chapter joined other groups and neighbors in the Read Across America program. The Brothers of Upsilon Nu selected Highland Springs Elementary School as the location for their participation. We have formed a relationship Highland Springs, so it became an easy choice for us from the many requests we received, stated Social Action Chairman Brother James Hunter. Next year we plan to expand our participation to several more schools as we celebrate the birthday of Dr. Seuss.
For those not familiar with the program, the National Education Association’s (NEA) Read Across America is an annual reading motivation and awareness program that calls for every child in every community to celebrate reading. In cities and towns across the nation, teachers, teenagers, librarians, politicians, actors, athletes, parents, grandparents, and others develop NEA’s Read Across America activities to bring reading excitement to children of all ages. Governors, mayors, and other elected officials recognize the role reading plays in their communities with proclamations and floor statements.
It is an amazing experience for me reading to the first-grade class. They were transfixed on me from the moment I sat down with my assigned book, “Pig the Winner” by Aaron Blakey. The kids were seated around me and I asked each of them to give me their name and then I introduced myself. As they introduced themselves, I thought to myself, wow, was I ever that young. I made it a point to stop during the reading and asked them questions about what I had read, the hands went up quickly and each student was heard.
Brother John Rivers, also read to a first-grade class as well. His assigned book was “Rainbow Fish”. He also thought the experience was amazing. When he finished, he had the class discuss lessons learned from the book. he read. Though the books we read were not that long, we found ourselves engaged with our classes for over an hour. The teachers were very gracious and let us continue to interact with the kids. Each student was encouraged to speak about the books and were very enthusiastic.
