Students Travel Around The World Of Books

By Larissa Lytwyn

Eight years ago, then Shelton-based third grade teacher Jennifer Buchta wanted to create a unique way of “differentiating the instruction” of literature in a way that students could themselves discover.

She also wanted the program to integrate various academic subjects.

Today, her creation takes students around the world — of books.

“The program, ‘Explore the World,’ brings students to the world’s seven continents, each assigned its own genre, including science, biography, fantasy, poetry, mystery, and sports,” Ms Buchta, today a teacher at Middle Gate Elementary School, explained.

Students could choose books from the class library, already divided into categories, or peruse their local library or private collections for reading material.

The books had to be approved for age and topic-appropriateness before students could begin reading.

“The project was a yearlong one,” Ms Buchta said. “It was great to see the students get excited about reading different kinds of books! Some of the students even went ‘around the world’ twice.”

While there was no direct correlation between a continent and its assigned genre, Ms Buchta said the map was useful for helping the students understand geography.

Fellow third grade teacher Tisha McCoy introduced the project to her students this year.

“I thought it was a very creative way of fostering students’ reading,” she said.

Recently, students culminated the program by summarizing the favorite books they had read that year into a memorable, personalized project.

“Some students create mobiles or posters, while others wrote letter correspondence between two of their book’s major characters,” said Ms Buchta.

Third grader Colin Dutt said that he liked reading books about sports because he is a big sports fan. “I read one really good book about the Boston Red Sox,” he said, himself a Yankees fan.

Jenna Hindes said she enjoyed reading a variety of books, including the fantasy, Chocolate Fever, by Robert Kimmel Smith and poetry including Pizza The Size of the Sun by Jack Prelutsky. “I really enjoy reading poetry,” she said, “and writing it, too.”

Jenna added that she enjoyed reading the Bailey School mystery series.

Another student, Kristin DeGirolamo, said she liked reading mystery novels, especially the Boxcar Children series.

“The program helped me better understand science,” said another student, Alex Strzelecki. “I really liked a book I read on rocks and minerals.”

Alex said he is also an avid comic book fan. “I like fantasy,” he said.

Next year, Ms Buchta said, she would like to increase the number of genres students explored.

“So far, of course, we’ve had only seven,” she said. “But there are so many different types of books out there! It would be great to expand it.”

Ms McCoy said that the program had been a “really fun challenge.”

“It really helped them learn more about different kinds of books,” she said, “and also allowed them to discover what kinds of books they liked best!”