U.S. Jones celebrates Seuss Week
U.S. Jones Elementary School commemorated the annual observance of the birthday of children’s author Dr. Seuss this week with a series of activities that culminated Friday.
“This is my first year being the librarian,” Seuss week organizer and U.S. Jones librarian Emily Windham said. “I’ve been teaching kindergarten at Westside (Elementary School) for eight years and this is my first time being in the library. I just wanted to do something to get them excited about it. They have really been reading a lot this week. They’ve just been very excited about it.”
The festivities are part of the nationally-observed Read Across America initiative, which is scheduled to coincide with the birth of Theodor Seuss Geisel, whose bevy works under the pseudonym Dr. Seuss have become iconic pieces of American children’s literature.
“It’s just timeless. It appeals to Pre-K students and even the fifth graders here still come in and check out the books,” Windham said of the wide appeal Seuss works still hold. “Some of them are harder than others. Some of them he did that are really easy to read. Some of them have tongue twisters.”
In keeping with the spirit of Read Across America Day, Mayor Mike Grayson signed a proclamation last week deeming Friday Read Across Demopolis Day.
Various leaders and community members from around Demopolis stopped by U.S. Jones throughout the day Friday to read Seuss classics to the elementary school classes.
Over the course of the week, USJ classes were afforded the opportunity to answer trivia questions regarding Seuss and his work.
Students competed in an art contest in which they redesigned the cover of a particular book from a list of choices.
Throughout the week, students were allowed to take AR quizzes based off of books they were reading as part of a competition in which the class with the most quizzes passed would be afforded a popcorn party in the library at a later date. As of Friday morning, U.S. Jones students had taken more than 2,000 quizzes and passed 1,679.
Students were encouraged to wear funny hats to school Friday. At 8:10 Friday morning, students donned their hats and spent 15 minutes reading.
The festivities were set to wrapped up Friday afternoon with a birthday party for Dr. Seuss in which students who had accumulated at least 50 AR points were invited to attend. As of Friday morning, some 60 students were in line for party participation. The cakes for the party were donated by Walmart and Vowell’s Fresh Market.
