Research tells us that teachers typically spend 4-6 weeks at the beginning of every school year re-teaching materials from the previous year. Why? Because students have forgotten what they learned during those blissful summer months, when reading took a backseat to other wild and carefree summer adventures. Not this year.
We're all for wild and carefree summer adventures here at Scholastic, but we're also all for summer learning, which is why we created the Scholastic Summer Reading Challenge eight years ago. The Scholastic Summer Reading Challenge aims to keep kids reading all summer long by establishing friendly competition between schools and offering kids a chance to challenge themselves in reading and win cool prizes for doing so. The program—which runs from May 5th to September 5th, 2014—prevents summer learning loss and makes kids feel good about reading.
I'm excited to announce that pre-registration for the Scholastic Summer Reading Challenge opens for teachers in exactly ONE WEEK. On Monday, April 7th, teachers will be able to register their classrooms to participate in the biggest summer reading challenge ever. And there are so many new features for teachers in the program this year:
- A revamped educator dashboard: You can now manage classes more easily, add and hide classes, import and download class lists, and more.
- New messaging to parents: You can send parents pre-scheduled emails with the click of a button. These emails contain program information, reminders to motivate their kids to keep reading during the summer months, and links to free resources to help them stay on task with their kids.
- A Reading Under the Stars theme: This year, we've integrated a space theme that is going to seriously impress your students. Not only do we have star and space-themed booklists and high-tech, interactive constellations on the website, we also have videos and resources from a NASA Astronaut and a Planetary Scientist.
- New teacher sweepstakes and school-wide prizes: Teachers can enter our sweepstakes for a chance to win a classroom library and 500 extra Reading Club bonus points! Plus, the two schools whose students have collectively read the most minutes this summer will win a visit from David Shannon (winning elementary school) and Gordon Korman (winning middle school). How cool is that?
There's so much more to discover this summer and I can't wait to share it with you.
So, on April 7th, go to www.scholasitic.com/summer to begin your registration process, check out the teaching resources, and enter the teacher sweepstakes! And remember, the program officially begins on May 5th—students can start logging minutes, earning virtual rewards, and unlocking constellations then!
We're looking forward to a great summer ahead.
