The event evolved from The Consortium for Public Education’s Check and Challenge initiative. Under the program, which was launched at the Consortium’s 2006 Leadership Retreat, nine participating districts each received checks for $5,000 along with a ‘challenge’ to find ways of reaching out to help families in their communities with newborn children begin developing their capacity to read long before they start school.

“We offered the Challenge because it’s so important that kids come to school ready to learn,” said Consortium Executive Director Linda Croushore, Ed.D. “Kids who start out behind are the most at risk for staying behind.”

South Allegheny’s first response to the challenge was a “Baby Shower for Literacy” at which new parents tried out activities recommended in A Guide to Your Child’s Literacy and received copies of the book. The Consortium publishes the handbook to give mothers and fathers tips and methods for beginning at birth to give kids the visual and verbal stimulation they need to prepare them to read.

The kindergarten registrations and orientation sessions, which South Allegheny began in 2007, are another method the district has used to meet the ‘challenge.’ At the latest registration, staff briefed parents on what kids will be doing in kindergarten and what benchmarks they’ll be helped to achieve. For example, while not all incoming kindergartners know the alphabet when they arrive, they’ll learn it by mid-year. They’ll also move beyond scribbling on paper, as many do when they first start, to printing letters and words.

Parents at the registration also received copies of the Consortium’s literacy guide. David Pribish, coordinator of the Consortium’s Literacy for Life initiative was on hand to talk with South Allegheny parents about putting together ‘literacy kits’ and helping not just their kindergartners but also any younger children and infants in their families develop the fine motor, visual and other skills needed for reading.