The chatter, laughter, and cheering of approximately 500 students at the Brandywine Heights Elementary School rose as classmates got up and smashed a whipped cream pie in a teacher’s face.
The excitement increased with chants of “Throw that pie. Throw that pie.”
Students from kindergarten through third grade had the chance to through pies at the faces of volunteer staff members including their superintendent, Andrew Potteiger, as a reward for reading 10,000 books.
Six names from each grade level were drawn from a hat to have the honors of flinging a pie.
Jason Cloud, kindergarten, said he read a Lego book and “Green Eggs and Ham.” He was one of the lucky students picked.
“I knew I was going to throw a pie and I threw it in one of the teacher’s face,” said Cloud. “They rubbed the pie off.”
During the reading challenge, every time the students completed a book, their parents filled out a cut out picture of a pie. The staff kept track of 10,000 pies all over the school, which helped the kids keep track of reaching their goal.
“It was actually really driven by our reading specialists and they really try to do something engaging to get our kids to read,” said Potteiger. “For me it was a culmination goal to see that many books read.”
Potteiger said he hadn’t done things like this since he was a principal. He recalled sleeping on the roof one time and other crazy stuff. He had requested to get his favorite pie in the face-cherry.
“To see that level of excitement about wanting to read on their own at home was just remarkable,” said Potteiger. “Assuming every kid read a book, that was a tremendous number of books for the kids to have read.”
Jennifer Snyder and Lindsay Yeakel, reading specialists, teach Title 1 Reading for those who need extra reading support. Snyder and Yeakel run a school-wide reading challenge every year to get all the students excited to read.
“It’s an awesome goal to challenge the kids to do,” said Snyder. “We wanted to strive them to the challenge. We had no idea we would reach the goal until only a little after mid-school year. We reached it about February.”
The district also offers other reading challenges within the classrooms through the Book It program with Pizza Hut. The students who meet the challenge receive coupons for a free personal pan pizza.
Potteiger said he has twin daughters, Grace and Avery, in the third grade and another daughter, Ella, in the first grade, and speaking from a parent’s perspective, it’s a great program.
“It is a great way for the kids to be motivated to read. Our girls want to do it and they get excited about it and they love it. It’s just a nice family night out then,” said Potteiger. “They feel special because they can order their own little pizza and get whatever they want on it. It really motivates what I see in my own children.”
Principal Karen Long said the students took the challenge on and worked really hard. They are very proud of them.
