Monday, August 29, 2011

Poetry Spoken Here

The teen mothers in the Athena Interactive Literacy Program had an exciting day at Northfire Studio recording their spoken word poetry.

“Taking the poetry out of the classroom and into a recording studio really brings the poetry to life for them,” said Reader to Reader executive director David Mazor.

“They have seen recording studios on MTV, so linking the poetry to the high-tech world of a professional studio creates a lot of excitement.”


Working with professional sound engineer Garrett Sawyer, the students not only recorded their poetry, but also got to see first-hand how sounds can be manipulated and edited to make a unique aural document.

In addition to the poetry, reggae music and beatboxing (a form of vocal percussion) filled the air.

Garrett Sawyer crafted a beatboxed soundtrack (performed by Reader to Reader’s own Kat Libby) to underscore the poetry. The energetic soundtrack made all the clearer the link between spoken word poetry and rap music.

2011 marks the third time Northfire Studio has hosted students in a Reader to Reader Program

“Northfire Studio is a world-class audio production facility that has produced a number of gold records, so we are extremely grateful for their donation of recording time for the Athena,” notes David Mazor. “This is their second year as part of the Athena Program and they also gave our students in the Navajo Mentoring Program an amazing experience when they visited in 2008.”

The week-long Athena Interactive Literacy Program brings together an exciting team of educators, writers, and artists, including noted writing teacher Peter Elbow, illustrious author Norton Juster, and Chef Bill Collins, a graduate of the Cambridge School of Culinary Arts with over 15 years professional experience, including the Ritz-Carlton Hotel in Boston. The students spend mornings exploring reading and writing in a variety of interesting settings, pick out hundreds of books for themselves and their children, develop family literacy materials, and spend their afternoons learning to cook healthy food for themselves and their children.

The program is a partnership between Reader to Reader and the Care Center in Holyoke, Massachusetts.

Funding is provided by a grant from PeoplesBank and a generous donation from Mary Ann Cofrin.

Friday, August 26, 2011

Athena Students Get Lots and Lots of Books!

Everyday the teen mothers participating in the Athena Interactive Literacy Program go home with lots of books for themselves and their children.

“This program gets so many books into the community,” says the Care Center’s education director, Ana Rodriguez, who notes that these students come from homes in Holyoke and Springfield that are often devoid of books.

Each day the participating teen mothers spend time going through Reader to Reader’s inventory of 10,000 books, picking out titles that intrigue them. By the end of the week the mothers have taken home hundreds books that they not only read themselves and to their children, but also share with friends and family.

Launched in 2010, the Athena Interactive Literacy Program features a week-long workshop that works with pregnant and parenting teens in order to build their reading and writing skills, and to explore healthy eating and cooking.

The program is a partnership between Reader to Reader and The Care Center in Holyoke, Massachusetts.

Funding is provided by a grant from PeoplesBank and a generous donation from Mary Ann Cofrin.

Thursday, August 25, 2011

Chef Bill Helps Athena Students Explore the World of Healthy Cooking

Food and fun where on the menu as Chef Bill Collins helped the teen mothers attending Reader to Reader’s Athena Interactive Literacy Program explore healthy eating and cooking.

The students spend two hours each day learning cooking techniques ranging from omelets and French toast to low-fat versions of Chicken Alfredo.

“We are so grateful to have Chef Bill, says Reader to Reader executive director David Mazor. “Bill is key to the Athena Program’s success. He’s both an educator and an entertainer. He brings such a fun energy to each lesson and the students really connect with him, which makes more open for all the writing exercises we do all week.”


Chef Bill Collins is a graduate of the Cambridge School of Culinary Arts with over 15 years professional experience, including the Ritz-Carlton Hotel in Boston

Launched in 2010, the Athena Interactive Literacy Program features a week-long workshop that works with pregnant and parenting teens in order to build their reading and writing skills, and to explore healthy eating and cooking.

The program is a partnership between Reader to Reader and The Care Center in Holyoke, Massachusetts.

Funding is provided by a grant from PeoplesBank and a generous donation from Mary Ann Cofrin.

Tuesday, August 23, 2011

Athena Mothers Explore Writing With Peter Elbow

Reader to Reader’s Athena Interactive Literacy Program kicked off its week-long workshop with a writing seminar from renowned writing teacher Peter Elbow. The author of Writing Without Teachers and Writing With Power, Elbow worked with the teen mothers attending the program on how to free up the writing process.

Launched in 2010, the Athena Interactive Literacy Program features a week-long workshop that works with pregnant and parenting teens in order to build their reading and writing skills, and to explore healthy eating and cooking. The program is a partnership between Reader to Reader and The Care Center in Holyoke, Massachusetts.

The young mothers in the program currently attend The Care Center where they are working on getting their G.E.D.s so they can attend college. Athena supplements their studies, giving them a dynamic week of exploration that moves beyond test taking to help them discover the joy of being a student.

The program brings together an exciting team of educators, writers, and artists, including noted writing teacher Peter Elbow, illustrious author Norton Juster, and Chef Bill Collins, a graduate of the Cambridge School of Culinary Arts with over 15 years professional experience, including the Ritz-Carlton Hotel in Boston. The students spend mornings exploring reading and writing in a variety of interesting settings, including recording poetry at a professional recording studio, and afternoons are dedicated to learning to cook healthy food for themselves and their children.

Funding is provided by a grant from PeoplesBank and a generous donation from Mary Ann Cofrin.

Monday, August 15, 2011

Another School Joins Ghana Project

The Akim Awisa Junior Secondary School in Akim Awisa, Ghana, has joined Reader to Reader’s Ghana Project. The school will receive books and computers to set-up a computer lab.

The Ghana Project also serves the Eno Boanimah Memorial Academy, Kasoa, Ghana, and Akim Oda Secondary School, Akim Oda, Ghana.

Tuesday, August 9, 2011

Target Grant Funds DiscoverBooks Program

A big thank you to Target for grant funding of Reader to Reader’s new DiscoverBooks Program.

Launching this fall, the DiscoverBooks Program helps children discover the joy of books through twice-monthly family reading groups that work with teen mothers and their children. The groups help mothers learn the family literacy essentials necessary for their children to go to kindergarten with well-developed pre-literacy and early literacy skills, and allow young children to explore the world of books and develop essential pre-reading skills. In addition to receiving book donations, the mothers and children engage in other activities, such as modeling reading behavior, board book making, letter and number games, and parent and child story creation that add a multi-sensory experience to boost their literacy skills development.

Friday, August 5, 2011

17 Computers for Ghana

A truckload of 17 Dell Optiplex GX620 computers with flat-screen monitors will be heading to Ghana to build computer labs at the Eno Boanimah Memorial Academy, Kasoa, Ghana, and Akim Oda Secondary School, Akim Oda.

Reader to Reader’s computer donation program is helping both schools set up resource centers which includes libraries and computer labs.

Tuesday, August 2, 2011

An Albanian Orphanage Gets a Reading Space

(Reader to Reader’s Kathryn Libby, who received one of the Davis Foundation’s prestigious 100 Projects for Peace grants, reports on her work building a fully stocked library space at an orphanage in Albania.)

After a long trip across the Atlantic Ocean, I have finally arrived in Tirana, the capital of Albania. The books and games have survived their long trip in our luggage and are soon to be on their way to the Zyber Hallulli Children’s Home, the orphanage that Iris Aliaj and I will be working with this month.

Reading is not a favored activity among most people here in Albania; although book vendors lay out dozens of aging, yellowed texts there are few buyers, and even fewer stores for new books. Our goal is to get the children at the orphanage interested in reading, and in the wonderful healing (and of course,escapist!) power of books. 36 children are housed in the orphanage; all are attending school, but we’ve been granted their evening time to read Harry Potter 7 aloud and encourage reading in the older kids.

As you can see, we also take some time to play games with the younger kids: Tana likes to make up her own rules. She graciously let me win half of the games we played.

There couldn’t be a greater need for books here: we visited the Children’s Home for the first time this weekend and were shocked at what we found. Although the library houses a fair number of books, nearly all of them are over 50 years old and in extremely poor condition. I picked a few up, and my fingers turned black! The children told us even mice would be ashamed to read these books.

To top it off, each child is only permitted to check out one book. As someone who often had ten books at a time out of my public library growing up, this seems too much to bear. We are working on getting a more lenient policy in the library.

One child, Mario, trades vocabulary with me like kids in the 90s traded Pokemon cards. He’s been my major source of new words in Albanian, and I think my love of reading is rubbing off on him. Nje Qershorin (June 1st) is Children’s Day here in Albania, and Iris and I attended the celebration at the orphanage. You can see little Çeleste dancing so beautifully in this picture! Each child received a book of their own from us. I chose the children’s version of Frankenstein for Mario, which was no small read, yet he finished it in just one day! We took him to a nearby bookstore and he picked out the first book of both the Artemis Fowl and Harry Potter series. I am so delighted that at least one boy has really come to love reading.

There is so much potential for growth here, and I am delighted to be making it happen. More news to come as the progress continues!

Best,
Kat