Skills-Based Lunch Bunch

This school year, I have begun eating lunch with two to three students once a week. During these lunches, we eat, have conversations and then we read and practice other skills!

The idea first came to me after a discussion I had with the parent of a student. The parent was expressing that she wanted her child to get an extra push in reading. I suggested that the student joins me on a weekly basis for some reading support. The student was so excited!

The first couple of weeks, it was just one-on-one with the student mentioned above. She would run up to me at recess and say, “I’m ready to read today!” She would even bring books from home. Books that she was comfortable with and had confidence in reading. Something I made sure to stress was that she ate most of her lunch before we began to read together. I wanted her to be able to take a brain break and make sure she was able to eat and not just focus on the reading. This also gave us time to get to know each other better and for her to tell me about her family and various trips she has been on.

After working with this student for a couple weeks, I reached out to another family and asked if they wanted their child to join us for lunch bunch. They agreed, so we all began to meet! Both students are on a similar reading level, so it was simple to pull books at their level to read with. Before we began last week, another student asked to join so it became the four of us.

Something I really appreciated was that the students were excited to read, but also happy to support one another. They would help each other with tricky words and cheer one another on. They were able to show so much compassion and cooperation. I also started giving students who weren’t reading with me another skill to work on. For example, while one student read with me, the other two practiced reading words together with the long vowel sound.

I am excited to keep doing lunch bunch with students. So far, the students have been enthusiastic about some extra learning time. They tell me about the books they want to bring from home for the next week. I would like to keep working with different students and help them grow socially and academically!