2008 Grant Proposal Details

Literature   Family School

Total: $500

Description:  Sharing literature is an important part of Family School. We ability group for all reading levels in grades 1-5. Houghton Mifflin provides wonderful lists of literature that supplement the "core" language arts program. We would like to purchase book sets from these lists to deepen understanding and background knowledge in subject areas that we are getting just an introduction to in our basal readers. Literature circles provide opportunities to share books and open up conversations that augment comprehension strategies that are being taught in the language arts curriculum. Students enjoy discussing books, and the experience of reading the same books as their classmates.

Why is this important?  We would like to have book sets to use for each grade level that are recommended for each unit of study. Many of the books are published in the last few years, and are not available to us from the IMC, or our school library. The leveled readers that are included with the materials we received are very short, and we find that our students want to settle in with novels on many of the subjects that we study.

Who will be served?  This project will provide classroom sets of books for 5 classrooms--approximately 124 students, from grades 1-5.

How will this be evaluated?  We will evaluate after each unit of study informally by assessing students understanding to see that they have developed a deeper comprehension of the subjects that are studied. Students will be able to discuss books, have increased comprehension, and in some cases will complete study questions for evaluative purposes.

Does this build on existing programs?  As explained above, our Reading program has wonderful lists of books to extend learning that were not included in the sets of materials that we received. It greatly enhances our ability to use the curriculum that we have already.

Budget:  We figure that it costs an average of $7.50 per paperback. This grant would allow us to buy about 66 books, or approximately 11 books per classroom--maybe a few more than that if we get a good deal! We will be able to start building libraries for each classroom of these supplemental books--this will provide 1 set for each classroom. We see this as an ongoing goal as we add more books each year.

Proposal #:  43