One more little thing

Here's a picture from the training: Anyone else thinking Ameri-Corpse. We look like a bunch of service-zombies. He he.

Third Quarter Training

This past weekend, we had our Third Quarter training, which was organized and executed by us, the members. Now that the boring, introductory stuff is taken care of, I simply wanted to say that it was a blast. I was groaning to myself about having to do another training, and that it was probably going to be sooooooo boring, except of course for the sessions that I was leading.

I couldn't have been more wrong. If anything, my sessions were the boring ones.

The training went awesomely! I had such a blast getting to teach again. I felt like I had my teaching spirit sucked out of my like Shang T'sung collecting a soul (you like the Mortal Kombat reference?). My experience in the professional classroom was not a good one, and there were times that I thought I would never get back into teaching; I honestly thought that the negative experience meant that I was simply not cut out for it. After this past weekend's training, my resolve is renewed! I had so much fun simply teaching, it didn't matter if it was Tai Chi, pointing out faults in tutoring programs, or encouraging the practice of public speaking techniques.

It also reminded me how hard teaching is, which renewed my respect for my former colleagues who are still teaching in the trenches of a school that did very little to support them. I am very glad to have had this experience, and though I'm sure many of my LiteracyCorps peers may have wanted me to simply stop talking at one point (or two), I am very grateful to have been given this opportunity.

Great job guys; you make this fun, not work.

-Ian

ps: Deb, where are those pictures you took? I think one that looks like we're all a bunch of zombies needs to make it's way onto the blog.

Dr. Seuss Day

On March 2, I planned a literacy event at E.K. Powe elementary school in honor of Dr. Seuss Day. We read the book "Oh, the Places You'll Go!" to a group of about 25 kids and then did reading comprehension questions with them and also two art projects.

One art project was a collage, using scraps and magazines donated to us by the Scrap Exchange here in Durham. The other project was a group mural, where all of the participants created small figures representing themselves that they added to a large path. This mural was given to the school and will be on display there for some time.

Our America Reads and Counts tutors helped out, and we also had other Duke tutor helpers as well as staff from both our organization and from E.K. Powe.

This was a fun event because I was able to bring my love for reading and teaching together with my love for art and imagination. I think it's really important to incorporate creativity into reading comprehension. In my experience, this helps students retain the information and also grow in their love for reading and for books. It was really important to me to have many books on site, even if they weren't reading through the entirety of them, to be physically handling the books. We got many Dr. Seuss books from local public libraries and also from personal libraries. It was a fun event that brought together many people.

National Literacy Awareness Week at the YWCA

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For National Literacy Awareness week I wanted to create an activity that would be educational and fun for parents and children. Typically on Monday afternoons I run a Toddler program where moms and their toddlers come for storytime and parenting information. In order to keep the storytime theme going I decided to invite an exceptional librarian to the YWCA to deliver the storytime in celebration of NLAW.

The librarian, Brandon, did an excellent job delivering an entertaining storytime! After storytime, we began the craft activity. Each person drew or painted the places that they go when they read into a giant sized book. She also informed the listeners about how they can obtain library cards and about the events that take place at the library.

Each mother and child got to unleash their artistic creativity in the name of reading. Everyone had a great time while learning more about the importance of literacy!