100 Dakota Elementary students brought their families to the Family Reading Night on November 29th. The theme was “Owls, Books, and Bears. Oh my!” Families followed the yellow brick road to the gym, where Wizard of Oz characters invited all to Follow the Yellow Brick Road with them to the land of great books. Mrs. Samuelson and Mrs. Curry did a fun skit to the book, Crazy Hair by Neil Gaiman and Dave McKean. Then families went off on their forest adventure to the Bear Den where, greeted by Bicksler Bear, they read bear books together; to the Owlery, where Mrs. Russell and friends helped them make owl bookmarks; to the Bat Cave where they saw Stellaluna on the smartboard; to Storybook Forest where students did a book walk and everyone got a new book (thanks to PTO). The Wizard of Oz characters (high school choir students) led everyone back to the gym where a munchkin (Hannah Harshbarger) representing the Fairy Tale Bunch and the Nursery Rhyme League welcomed them to Readingland. The tin man (Colin Ebbers), the scarecrow (Bailey Hoffman),and the lion (Jameel Buss) sang ‘If I Only Had a Book”. Dorothy (Maddie Aalund) shared “Somewhere In the Library…”, and then they all sent everyone off on the yellow brick road once more to the wonderful world of great books. Everyone left with a treat bag and a family picture. The event was planned and presented by the Dakota Elementary Reading Team and funded by the Dakota PTO.
