LYNCHBURG, Va. – Making sure students can see themselves in the books they read is a project a local school is working on.
They meet online once a week after reading library books from Robert S. Payne Elementary School and seeing who those books represent. They’ve categorized more than one thousand books, including about 25% of the picture books and chapter books.
“The goal of this project is to have the collection of library books that we have better match our student population,” said Tracy Proffitt, Lead Instructional Coach at Robert S. Payne Elementary School.
The SMILE project stands for “seeing myself in the library everywhere.”
Proffitt says a teacher’s idea sparked it.
“I remember thinking the books that you are advertising to your students don’t necessarily match exactly who is going to be in your classroom. We’ve been talking about how representation in books and images in the classroom are really important and I wanted to push them in the right direction,” said Proffitt.
“I like that they can see themselves in the library everywhere and I also like it that they’re taking the lead in this project whereas they’re telling us what they see and how it reflects back to them in some of the characters looking like them,” said Barbara Eggleston, a fifth-grade instructional assistant who is also part of the SMILE project.
“Sometimes we as teachers forget about where the children come from and we put our beliefs on them and that’s not what we want to do, “said Diane Stratton, the family engagement liaison. She says the majority of their students are African American and this can give them a sense of pride.
“There have not been enough books in our library that meets the diversity of what our children are,” said Stratton. “It will spark children to be more interested in reading. They’ll connect with their characters as far as the neighborhoods they live in, how they’re living and then they can share with others.”
Once they’re done reviewing books, the students have $2,000 from the Lynchburg Education Foundation to buy new library books. The project was part of this year’s education grants they give out annually.
Robert S. Payne staff would love to get other elementary schools working on similar projects.