Hello Furry Families,
We had a great year at Furry Elementary School. Our children worked incredibly hard this year and we are so proud of them.
We were able to experience so many wonderful things together this past year. Our field trips to the farm, Imagination Station and Osborn Park connected our learning in the classroom to opportunities in our world. We worked together to continue to instill a love of reading in our children by participating in our One School One Book reading and inviting the original author of the Pete the Cat stories, Eric Litwin to our school.
Mrs. Smith, our School Counselor taught us how to be kind to those around us and also helped us get ready for learning each day by doing mindfulness activities with us. Our LEGO club had fun creating amazing things together and the Erie County Master Gardeners helped our Garden Club learn about plants and also helped us start our own gardens. This doesn’t even count all of the special memories our staff created for our children within their classrooms. Amazing things were happening every day.
We’re looking forward to a summer full of fun with friends and families and we’re so grateful to live in a community that offers many things to keep everyone active. Please make time to read with your children each day. Research indicates 2 months of reading skills and 2.5 months of math skills are lost over a single summer.
Adults can do many things to help children continue to read during the summer:
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Access to books is critical. The public library is an excellent free resource for families to have access to books of a wide range of interests and reading levels, as well as librarians to guide children and families in selecting great books.
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When children select reading materials themselves and read for enjoyment, they receive the most gains in reading achievement, including better reading comprehension, writing style, vocabulary, spelling, and grammatical development. Also, the longer that this free voluntary reading is practiced, the more consistent and positive the results. Thus, summer programs, such as those offered in public libraries, that allow and encourage children to choose what they read are likely to be most successful.
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Children and teens tend to read more when adults encourage them to read and when they see those adults reading often themselves.
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Children that feel that reading is fun tend to read more often, so summer programs that help make reading enjoyable and social are most successful.
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Reading just four to six books over the summer has the potential to prevent a decline in reading
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achievement scores from the spring to the fall, so even small steps are very beneficial.
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Preventing summer slide is most effective when community organizations—including schools, public libraries, community centers, parent groups, social service agencies, and others—work together to encourage kids to read, make reading fun, and to reach families about the importance of reading over the summer.
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Parents, caregivers, and other adults can help stem summer slide by reading themselves, as children that see adults in their lives reading often tend to read more themselves.
Wishing you a safe and happy summer!
~Miss Long