Students from Riverton School celebrated Read Across America with a “fairy godmother” at the Porch Club of Riverton on March 4.
Dressed as the character, Erica Harr, director and choreographer of Moorestown High School’s theater program, read “The Lion and the Mouse,” “The Good Egg,” “The Book With No Pictures” and “The World Needs Who You Were Made to Be.”
“We love any chance to be silly,” Harr said. “It’s so sweet to see; even in the second grade, these kids long for a chance to just laugh and be silly and be young kids. And that’s a really sweet thing to see.”
Harr also sang “The Age of Not Believing,” from the Disney film “Bedknobs and Broomsticks,” to kindergarteners and first and second graders.
“ … They’re at the age where they stop believing in magic and they stop believing in themselves, and the song is just about remembering to hold onto those things,” Harr explained. “Which I think reading helps you hold onto that magic a little bit longer.”
Harr noted the different themes in “The Book With No Pictures,” “The Good Egg” and “The World Needs Who You Were Made to Be.”
“I think that reading can be fun … ‘The Book With No Pictures” is just a fun book,” she said. “ … But then I love that ‘The Good Egg’ also has a message that it’s okay not to be perfect.”
“‘The World Needs Who You Were Made to Be’ is this beautiful story about accepting differences, not just accepting them, but celebrating them,” Harr added.
Riverton School teacher Christine Lubitski coordinated with Porch Club member Susan Dechnik to host the students there. She noted that the school has had special guests read books to students for Read Across America, such as “The Cat in the Hat.”
“Over the past couple of years, we wanted to make it more inclusive to other authors and other genres,” Lubitski said.
The Porch Club hosted the reading event for the first time this year, and it was also the first time students had traveled outside of the classroom since the pandemic.
“We decided to try to have a little feel of a class trip, even though it’s not an actual class trip,” Lubitski said. “So we wanted to give them the feel of a little excursion, because it kind of is what the memory is all about.”
The club gave out bracelets as keepsakes and Lubitski explained how students were excited to listen to Harr read.
“Our little ones, for the first couple of groups that we’ve seen, are just fascinated with her and the stories,” Lubitski said. “This was a perfect way to end our week, I think.”
