HOOKED ON BOOKS

February 22 through March 26 2010

This is our 6th Annual Hooked On Books Event where "everyone reads the same book!"

Students in EC 3/4 through 2^nd Grade all read books by the author Martin Waddell. The finale for their event was a concert.  Students in 1^st and 2^nd grades performed a musical version of the book Squeak-a-lot.

Students in 3^rd through 5^th Grade read a book by Michael Morpurgo.  The title was Kensuke's Kingdom.  In this book a family buys a boat and sets out to sail around the world.  Ricardo Diniz, a solo sailor who was Nominated Ambassador for Oceans by the European Commission, spoke to the students about sailing.  In the story Michael, and his dog, fall overboard and wash onto an island in the Pacific.  Artists and musicians from the island nation of Indonesia came to CAISL and presented shadow puppet theater and music played by angklungs, which are musical instruments made out of two bamboo tubes attached to a bamboo frame.  The final event was an Island Party where students did everything from tasting tropical fruits to survival games.

Students in 6th through 11th Grade all read a book by Greg Mortenson.  The title was Three Cups of Tea: One Man's Journey to Change the World One Child at a Time.   Greg Mortenson is lost while climbing K2 and is taken in by the people of a very small and poor village.  He is so impressed by their hospitality that he decides to build them a school.  He has since started several organizations, The Central Asia Institute and Pennies for Peace, that fund raise and build schools in Pakistan and Afghanistan.

The book begins with Greg Mortenson’s failed climb of K2 so we invited a preeminent Portuguese mountain climber to tell us about his climbing. Helder Santos has climbed mountains around the world and has organized six major expeditions to the world’s highest mountains including the first Portuguese expedition to the Himalayas.  Mortenson was impressed with hospitality that included the drinking of tea so we invited people in to tell us about the importance of tea in Argentina, the Azores, England, Japan, and Morocco. 

The final piece of Mortenson’s story is his community service.  Our celebration opened with community service as students helped gather school materials, for a school in Morocco, that were delivered by three teachers who were traveling there.  The final event was a presentation by the Community Service Club about the possibilities of community service.

For pictures from these events please see the sidebar on the left of this page.

HAPPY READING!!