Fuzzy buddies help first-graders build their reading skills
—Photo courtesy KYLA FRENCH Wyatt Felts and Haylyn Ashford-Brown, left to right, bundled up their puppies in hand-knit sweaters for an outdoor reading session.
—Photo courtesy KYLA FRENCH \Kootenai Elementary first-graders Gage Nelson, left, and Adrian Hunter, right, enjoy some reading buddy time.
-- Photo courtesy KYLA FRENCH First grade students Wyatt Mujo, Hudson Brown and Mason Shaffer, left to right, and their puppies -- wearing hand-knit sweaters -- read together in the grass.
SANDPOINT — A local benefactor has upped the ante on a popular first-grade reading program called Learning with Lucky. Developed by a Post Falls teacher in 2005, the program provides a stuffed yellow or black Labrador retriever reading buddy to each participating first-grader. Fledgling readers can earn accessories for their buddies such as collars and leashes by reaching study milestones during a designated reading period each day.
Kootenai Elementary School, along with other Lake Pend Oreille schools, participates in the Learning with Lucky program, thanks to generous community funding. Danae Meyer-Beers, a former Kootenai paraprofessional and a caring community member, has made the program even more special for Kootenai first-grade readers with a gift of 73 hand-knit puppy sweaters, enough to clad each reading buddy in jaunty style.
"All different and unique to the child, and their interests and likes. It took over 3 weeks to finish the project," said Kyla French, first-grade teacher at Kootenai Elementary.
"Learning with Lucky has been a community funded program for first-graders in the Lake Pend Oreille School District. We have been fortunate to Learn with Lucky for the past four years. This fall, we learned this would be our last year," French said. "Northside teacher Carolyn Whalen wrote a grant and asked Pandhandle Alliance For Education (PAFE) to fund our puppies. Last week, we were awarded the full grant of $9,500 to continue the program."
According to French, Whalen and other first-grade teachers, the Learning with Lucky Program has been an excellent incentive for their emergent readers.
"This program is crucial to both me and my students. I cannot envision teaching first grade without it," said Whalen in a testimonial for the Lucky system.
"Parents and community members have donated items for the puppies as an added incentive to achieve different goals ... It has been VERY motivating (for students) to keep reading and earning the next prize for the puppies."
At the end of the school year, the first-graders get to take their reading buddies home to keep. Many will continue to read with them at home.
"I have previous students that still read and sleep with their puppies. They love it!" French said.