In February, Daly Elementary celebrated Literacy Month. Throughout the month, Daly students were on a quest to read as much as they can and help raise money for the school. To celebrate, students participated in dress up days, book swaps and a read-a-thon. On dress up days, students wore PJ’s and dressed up as their favorite book character to celebrate Literacy Month. Throughout the month, students could participate in a book swap where they donated gently used books and at the end of the month, students got to select and take home a new book from the swap.
In addition, Daly hosted its first Community Read Aloud day on Feb. 16. Daly Elementary School Library Media Specialist Kim Pinto and the Port Washington Public Library’s Director of Children’s Services Rachel Fox organized the Community Read Aloud. They invited about 20 members of the community to visit Daly’s classes and read to the class.
Visitors included Port Washington School District (PWSD) Assistant Superintendent Stephanie Allen; PWSD Assistant Superintendent Sean Feeney; PWSD Administrator Ira Pernick; PWSD Assistant Superintendent Chris Shields; PWSD Board of Education member Julie Epstein; PWSD Board of Education Member Racher Gilliar; PWSD Board of Education Member Nanette Melkonian; Former Daly Principal Sheri Suzzanne; Town of North Hempstead Councilmember Mariann Dalimonte; Town of North Hempstead Supervisor Jennifer DeSena; New York State Assemblywoman Gina Sillitti; Port Washington Police District (PWPD) Sergeant Peter Griffith; PWPD Detective Tony Guzello; PWPD Commussioner Angela Lawlor Mullins; PWPD Sergeant Suzanne Petrizzo; Port Washington Water District Commissioner Mindy Germain; Port Washington Public Library staff Lesley Siegel and Storyteller Jackie Orkin.
The visitors were able to see the great work students have been doing throughout the month, read a story to a class and chat about all their favorite stories.
The Daly HSA sponsored Daly’s Literacy Month and shared that Daly students read for over 146,000 minutes in February for the read-a-thon. The HSA shared that Ms. Voyer’s class logged the most minutes in the read-a-thon with 20,189 minutes. Each grade in Daly had a top reader that logged the most minutes. The top readers are as follows: Sabrina Raskin-Koutros, Kindergarten; Liev Lustig-Atkinson, first grade; Ryan Sittenreich-Trazoff, second grade; Ethan Markowitz-Eisen, third grade; Emily Cheng, fourth grade; Riya Malik and Bradley Ganatra, fifth grade.
“This was a big school fundraiser. So the students did a read-a-thon all month where kids had to read as much as they could and they logged their minutes. And they also had their parents ask for donations from family and friends,” shared Pinto.
With the money raised, the Daly HSA plans to purchase a new robotics table and chairs for the Daly STEAM Lab and they funded a new program called “Book Breaks”, where students will enjoy virtual author visits with some of their favorite writers. The HSA also purchased a few dozen new books for the library and will be able to add some fun new enhancements to the playground.
