School celebrates Read Across America Day
EL CENTRO — Like many other schools in the county and across the nation, B.T. Washington Elementary School here celebrated National Read Across America Day on Monday.
Read Across America was created in 1997 by the National Education Association as an initiative on reading. March 2 is recognized as National Read Across America Day, as it’s the birthday of Dr. Seuss.
The late author was indeed honored at Washington Elementary.
Students wore handmade Cat in the Hat paper headbands, and decorations with Dr. Seuss characters were on every book table.
Teresa Velasquez, the school’s librarian for 24 years, wore a Read Across America polo shirt with Dr. Seuss characters on it.
Teresa Gilbert, who retired two years ago after being a kindergarten and first grade teacher for 28 years at Washington Elementary, volunteered to dress up as Cat in the Hat — face paint and all.
As part of the event, more than 400 books were spread out across tables in the school’s library.
For the first time ever, the books came from the First Books program — a feat organized by Velasquez.
Thanks to the program, the school only paid the shipping price for the books.
Every student in the school got to pick out a free book and take it home.
Students were also given a bookmark, which marked the launch of the school’s annual book marker competition.
Additionally with each book, students were given a take-home activity to complete.
The take-home activity was AVID-based (Advancement Via Individual Determination), and focused on inquiry with higher level questioning, along with creativity.
All books were accelerated reader level books and were approved by the district librarian.