Washington County Enterprise-Leader
Story Time Isn’t Just For Librarians
PRAIRIE GROVE RESOURCE OFFICERS CONNECT THROUGH BOOKS
PRAIRIE GROVE — Prairie Grove’s school resource officers describe themselves as “just two normal guys with no artistic ability” trying to stay connected with the kids in their community.
Since Gov. Asa Hutchinson sent students home for virtual instruction because of the covid19 pandemic, corporals David Faulk and Travis Stills have been reading children’s books online through their Facebook page.
The two are using Prairie Grove High School’s library to record their videos and the quality of their videos has evolved over time.
At first, Faulk said, they recorded one officer standing with the book and turning the pages as he read. Now, they are using a document reader in the library to show the pages of the book on a screen behind them as they read. They’re also using iMovie to edit the videos.
Faulk said they are correcting some of their reading errors and others they are leaving in the video.
“We really wanted it to be real,” he said. “If I mess up on the word turtle, I mess up on the word turtle and I just keep on. We felt like if we messed up, it shows kids that
it’s OK for them to mess up. We want to show them that we’re not perfect either.”
Last week, they decided to make other improvements and began adding a little more drama to the videos, acting out the books somewhat and using different voices for characters in the books.
Stills admits with schools closed and families encouraged to stay at home as much as possible, he has felt at a loss somewhat on what to do every day.
The two discussed ideas on how to stay connected with the school.
“If you want to know what we do here, we’re just two normal guys with no artistic ability,” Faulk said. “We just looked at the idea that we’re not connected to the kids and we’re not connected to the school anymore, and it’s really our job to stay connected to community and kids.”
By reading books online, parents are “willing to invite us into their homes, even though it’s via Facebook,” Faulk added.
The officers have branched out in other ways to reach more students. They’ve posted some fitness videos, two videos on how to cook French toast and cookies and an art video.
Looking for even more ways to connect, the officers decided to start naming a Student of the Week, based on recommendations from parents for kids who are meeting certain criteria.
Stills said the students have to be up to date on their AMI school work (alternative method of instruction), be a help around the house and possibly complete a community service project (within reason taking into consideration social distancing guidelines).
Appropriate examples of community service might be mowing the neighbor’s yard or in one case, a student helped her church with its online service.
“Right now, you could wake up at 10 o’clock, do your couple hours of AMI and then sit around in the room the rest of the day doing YouTube or playing on TicToc,” Faulk said.
The Student of the Week project allows the officers to acknowledge and reward students who are finishing school work and using their time in other productive ways, Faulk said.
Each Friday, three representatives from the school look at the nominations and vote on a Student of the Week. The winner receives a $15-20 candy basket that is left on the front step of the student’s home.
Books come first, though, and Stills said the videos seem to be fairly successful.
“It’s nothing to have 500-600 views and some of our older ones are getting up there into over a thousand,” Stills said.
They’ve used books from the elementary library, the public library and some books dropped off by parents. The officers also are taking requests.
“We’re about to run out of books so we need some more ideas for books to read,” Stills added.
While some time is spent recording and editing videos, the officers also are back on patrol with school closed for the remainder of the year. Both are on duty Wednesdays and they are splitting the rest of the week to work patrol.
“Reading books has allowed us to stay active in what we’re actually employed to do, which is community outreach and the kids,” Faulk said.