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Original request: I am the librarian at a Title I school. We are interested in participating in Heifer International's Read to Feed program (http://www.readtofeed.com/). I have searched the archives and found some information about this program, but am interested in additional info. (I did see one request for information that was made in the past year, but did not see a HIT.) I'm particularly interested in hearing about: - how schools tallied their information - by time, pages read, books read etc. - any problems or glitches that you encountered I would also really like to hear from anyone who used corporate sponsors to support this program rather than having students find individual sponsors. Any information that you can provide about how this worked would be very helpful. These are the responses I got: Hi - I am a 4th grade classroom teacher switching to the library next year, but I've had my class participate in "Read to Feed" for the past 3 years. It is a wonderful organization to work with, and the students benfit so much from both the reading and knowing that they are making an impact on their world. I've only ever had students recieve individual pledges for the number of books read, so I have no info. on corporate sponsors for you, but I just wanted to recommend the program. I can't say enough positive things about it. I implemented the program at our school last year and it was a huge success! Unfortunately due to some scheduling glitches, I was unable to schedule it this year, but we are aiming for fall of next year for our 2nd Annual “Read to Feed” Marathon. The materials that were provided by Read to Feed were wonderful and included a video, a children’s book, parent letters, flyers, brochures, collection envelopes, and stickers. Ours is a small, specialized school with 125 students K-12 who are deaf/hard of hearing or blind/visually impaired. We had 56 students participate and they read over 7,000 pages during one 4 hour reading marathon and raised $1500! We organized our program as a reading marathon by dividing the kids into reading teams of 4-5 students. During the 4 hour reading marathon, the members of each team rotated into the library for 30 minutes reading sessions, documenting the number of pages read during each of their reading sessions. The Reading Marathon occurred in the evening and staff volunteers monitored the readers and helped manage the transition of students in and out every 30 minutes. Our cafeteria and staff volunteers also provided refreshments for us. Prior to the reading marathon, the students solicited money from sponsors at home and on campus as “cents per page” donations for the team page total (like 10¢/page), but most people gave $5-10 cash donations.. I kept track of the total money each team earned on an Excel spreadsheet. After the marathon, the teams met and “spent” the money their team earned by choosing the animals they wanted to donate to Heifer. I created a PowerPoint presentation of photos taken during the marathon and highlighting each team’s total pages read, money earned, and animals purchased. Prized were awarded to the top 3 highest earning teams and the top 2 students who solicited the most in donations as well as for the top 2 teams with the highest total pages read. The students were SO proud and it really was quite an accomplishment for our students, our deaf students in particular, as reading is difficult for them and they typically read well below grade level. Our blind students chose to read in 1 hour sessions and one of our Braille readers said, at the end of her second hour, “I’ve read til my fingers are numb!”. Anyway, a GREAT program which really helped our students see needs beyond their own. I would highly recommend this program for any school! The “Read to Feed” website has lots of resources – a curriculum guide, story book recommendations, activities, etc. I hope you decide to give it a try. It all went pretty smoothly, although the money collection was a bit of a pain. But part of that is our particular situation. About 60% of our students are residential and go home each weekend. So allowing the time (2-3 Fridays) to get envelopes sent home initially to solicit donations (and getting them returned!) and then sending the envelopes out again to collect the money (and getting them returned) was a bit of a hassle. It was very time consuming for me, but I organized & implemented it alone. It would work better to have a committee undertake this project. Of course, you can organize it any way you like – I used the evening reading marathon idea. I think the website gives ideas on the ways other schools have implemented it. Good luck! I'd be interested in seeing a hit of your responses. I bet I could get some new ideas. We just did it by books read. The kids each had an envelope to collect the sponsor's names and per book amount. We raised over $1000 with little effort. I am in a 1st-3rd grade school with 600 students in southern New Jersey. Thanks to all who responded - Gundry Rowe Gaithersburg Elementary School Gaithersburg, MD growe1979@yahoo.com --------------------------------- Talk is cheap. Use Yahoo! Messenger to make PC-to-Phone calls. Great rates starting at 1/min. -------------------------------------------------------------------- Please note: All LM_NET postings are protected by copyright law. You can prevent most e-mail filters from deleting LM_NET postings by adding LM_NET@LISTSERV.SYR.EDU to your e-mail address book. 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