Celebrating Children’s Reading Success
One of the most successful ideas in my last job, where I was a librarian to elementary school students, was something called Fun Fridays.
If classes had earned positive feedback and accomplished their tasks during the prior week’s library lessons, they had free time on Friday to take part in special activities.
The main features of Fun Fridays were learning stations with materials available for students to explore, including:
- building blocks and LEGOs
- a treasure chest with costumes, a mirror, and a selfie station
- games, such as chess and board games
- art activities
Playing teacher
My favorite part of Fun Fridays, however, was when students found the books we had read throughout the year, then played ‘school’.
Students gathered around different whiteboards and chalkboard easels, got a group of their friends together, and took turns playing teacher. They would seat their friends around them, share a story, and write on the board. They would also draw pictures from the story or even just write words from the book.
I loved how students wanted to replicate the discussion and community building that go on in our library lessons. And whenever I asked students to tell me their favorite part of Fun Friday, they’d inevitably say taking turns playing ‘teacher’ for their classmates.
