WILD About Reading

What do singing beetles, storytelling, a Chinese praying mantis, free books, snakes, reading, snapping turtles, Ben and Jerry's and Predator World have in common?

Give up? They are all related to our new WILD About Reading at-home reading program!

Students received new green folders to keep track of their reading progress about a week ago along with a free book from last year's Target Store Grant and a letter explaining the rules and procedures of the program. Hopefully all of our students have started reading to meet the program goal for kindergarten and first grade of reading 100 books by April 23 or to reach the second and third grade program goal of reading 2000 minutes by April 23. Students who meet the reading goal will be invited to attend a special field trip to Predator World in Branson West and a trip to the Landing for ice cream donated by Ben and Jerry's. Last year we had two classrooms with 100% participation. Wouldn't it be something if we had 100% participation schoolwide?

What about the singing beetles, Chinese praying mantis, snakes and snapping turtles? Watch this quick Smilebox show of our WILD About Reading kickoff assembly featuring guest speaker, Randy Dietz and a few of his WILD friends.

Make a Smilebox slideshow

Tires to Tiles

KES students had the opportunity to learn more about the process of making our new playground tiles from guest speaker, Ernie Knight of the National Playground Compliance Group. The students learned that scrap tires are a hazard as they can catch fire creating pollution and can be a breeding ground for rodents, reptiles and insects. To make the tiles, the tires are ground into small pieces, the metal is removed with powerful magnets and the tire pieces are mixed with an adhesive and pigment and poured into molds to make the tile shape.

During the presentation, the students had the opportunity to share information that they knew that related to recycling, helping them connect their prior knowledge with this new learning. Students at all grade levels understood that recycling items helped reduce the amount of trash we produce and could help save money. I was especially impressed that we had a first grader who was able to explain how pollution affected the ozone layer and the function of the ozone layer and a third grader who related information that she had learned during the electrical safety presentation (that it was the law that electric companies have to replant trees to replace the ones they cut down to allow for power lines) to this new presentation.

To learn more about the environment, recycling, health and much, much more with your child visit the EPA Environmental Kids Club.