Arlington Heights, IL – Just after 1 pm at Patton Elementary, a group of fourth graders were playing 20 questions with their teacher Miss Miller, a game she started to occupy the crazed minds as they waited for their skype session with a popular author.

Jody Feldman was finishing up another skype session as her day was packed with reading aloud to children across the country for World Read Aloud Day. Suddenly, the Skype ring stopped and the connection sound rang. 

The fourth graders cheered and started waving their arms wildly. Feldman, the author of the chapter book series The Gollywhopper Games, and the students had obviously heard it.

Feldman read a few pages of her first Gollywhopper series to the students and then fielded some questions.

“What inspired you to write The Gollywhopper Games?,” one student asked.

“How long does it take to write a book?” another asked.

Feldman took each question and opened up to the Panther students as Patton’s proud LMC Director, Idelle Melamed looked on.

This was the fifth of seven total read alouds that Melamed scheduled for the various grades at Patton to celebrate World Read Aloud Day. Patton wasn’t the only school that celebrated this day so boisterously. In fact, if you checked the hashtag #WorldReadAloudDay you would have seen representation from all of District 25’s Elementary Schools, finding all different ways to read aloud to one another.

Patton’s Monarch Family Reading Night

It wasn’t lost on Patton parent Chris Fries on how good and important a Monarch Award nominated book was to his child Carter.

“Carter loves books,” Fries said. “It sounded like fun.”

Carter chose the big rocking chair, normally reserved for his former Kindergarten teacher, Miss Palmer, to read aloud to his dad.

“I like being in this chair because now I am his same height,” Carter said, smiling at his dad.

Carter read one and a half books aloud to his dad before the bell rang to switch stations. On Monarch Family Reading Night, students and their families received their own book mark that acted as a passport. The more books they read as they switched rooms, the more stickers they received.

There were activities in each of the rooms to complete after the book was finished as well as a character scavenger hunt.

It was estimated that 150-175 students and guardians packed Patton for this night capping off a wonderful and full day of reading.