FeedsStudents surprised with free dictionaries
On Monday, hundreds of Westland students learned a lesson in giving when members of Plymouth/Westland Grange 389 distributed dictionaries to each third grader.
Beginning at 9 a.m. in the gymnasium of Wildwood Elementary School, the group went from school to school armed with bins filled with paperback dictionaries.
The effort was based on a national endeavor known as The Dictionary Project, but for Sharon Strebbing, master of Grange 389, the project was more than a simple philanthropic gesture. As an elementary school student, she herself was given a dictionary by a family member, a gift she credits with helping her succeed in all levels of school. Now, she said, she hopes that the Grange gifts will help Westland children succeed.
“It’s a dream that’s finally come true for me,” she said. “We ended up passing out more than 700 dictionaries.”
In addition to the students, she said that identical dictionaries were provided to many of the teachers, administrators, and other school personnel on Monday.
“I can’t believe the response we got from the principals, the teachers, and the students,” she said. “It was just fantastic.”
The response from the students was particularly endearing, she said.
“They just glowed,” said Strebbing. “It was like we gave them candy at Christmas.”
The Grange chapter, working in conjunction with school administrators, spent months searching for a cost-effective dictionary that would also lend itself to the needs of the school curriculum, she said.
Wayne-Westland School Superintendent Gregory Baracy gave his support to the effort.
“It’s a good project,” he said. “I think that not only are our students appreciative, our parents are appreciative as well.”He added that he doesn’t expect the students’ interest to wane anytime soon, either. In Wayne, the dictionary project is already well established. Members of the Wayne Rotary routinely distribute dictionaries to children who attend third grade at the elementary schools in the city. There, Baracy said, it isn’t unusual to see students flipping through the dictionaries years after they were first received.
“Many of our kids don’t have a dictionary at home,” he said. “They use it on a regular basis.”
It’s a tradition Strebbing said that she hopes to see develop in Westland. The Grange chapter is small, with fewer than 20 members, so collecting the roughly $1,300 needed to purchase the paperback, child-friendly dictionaries while still fundraising for other efforts posed a challenge, she said.
“The good things our organizations do are supported by the people,” she said. “We’ve been trying to get involved in it for years. It just finally worked out.”
According to the Dictionary Project web site, www.TheDictionaryProject.com, the goal of the South Carolina-based program is to “improve the reading ability and comprehension of all children, everywhere.” The site goes on to say that their efforts are designed to “encourage children to use dictionaries so that they will be able to use the English language effectively.”
The Dictionary Project operates nationwide with service organizations such as Rotary, Grange, Kiwanis, and the Lions Club donating many of the dictionaries. According to the project web site, more than 50,000 dictionaries have been distributed in Michigan alone during the 2006-2007 school year.
