Purpose:

To help promote international literacy development, and provide professional development opportunities related to the improvement of reading and writing instruction in the area of international literacy.

Committee: 

Mal Keenan, Co Chair
Carol Owles, Co Chair
Linda Tobin, Blackhawk    
Karen Zeigler, Central Illinois    
Blanca Campillo, CARA
Pamela Godt, CIRP
Dawn Paulson, East Central-EIU    
Gina Lofgren, Fox Valley
Mary Sussman, ICARE
Katrina Tammen Reber, Illini  
Ruth Quiroa, ILLC
Noma Simpson, ITA
Desiree Colvin, Illinois Valley    
Ilyse Brainin, Lake Area    
Kim Winter, Lewis and Clark
Roxann James, Macon County    
Carol Owles, Mid-State    
Katherine Schumacher, Mississippi Valley
Barbara Swick, Northern Illinois
Joan Hartman, Northwestern Illinois    
Cindy Gerwin, Prairie Area  
Kathy Morrison, Sauk Valley
Christine Seidman, SCIRA
Elizabeth Strejcek, SRL
Diana Woods, South Eastern
Shiryl Walquist, SIRC  
Sheree Kutter, Starved Rock    
Laura Roney, Two Rivers    
Annie Robertson, Vermilion Valley
Kathleen Sweeney, West Suburban
Anita Lovell, Western Illinois  
Joyce Eddy, Will County

Grants:

The International Committee of the Illinois Reading Council has created a grant to promote literacy projects internationally. Studies indicate that poverty levels and literacy rates are inversely proportional. By supporting our international community in the areas of literacy, it in turn improves our universal society. The IRC wants to support these efforts. The International Grant Application and Deadlines are available online. The maximum amount per grant is $1,000. The application deadline is May 1, 2012. Grants will be awarded for the fiscal year ending June 30, 2013. Awards will be announced by July 1, 2012.

Grant Review Committee: 

Mal Keenan, Chair
Jean Bowman
Kimberly Lancaster
Laura Strebler
Ann Yanchura

Projects:

• A to Z Literacy Movement aims to improve the lives of Zambia's impoverished children through literacy development by providing schools and communities with quality books that inspire children to read.  In 2010, A to Z Literacy hopes to provide a full shipping container of books to the orphans of My Fathers House and the children at Shine Reading Academy and Calvary Baptist School in Zambia. A full shipping container holds nearly 22,000 books and it costs nearly $1.00 per book to ship.  For more information about the A to Z Literacy Movement, please contact Mal Keenan.

• Guatemalan Schools benefit from handicraft sales at annual IRC Conference.  One of IRC's International Projects is to provide as many books to the classrooms in Guatemala.  In February, a team of IRA members travel to Guatemala to work in their elementary schools and in their "Normales" (teacher training schools) for one week.  While in Antigua, Guatemala, several Reading Councils in the U.S. purchase  handicrafts from small shops and vendors to sell at various meetings and conferences.  The profits from these sales will be used to purchase books for Guatemalan classrooms, teachers, and students.  Look for the Guatemalan Handicraft Booth at the annual IRC Conference.  For more information about the Guatemalan Schools Project, please contact Carol Owles.

• Literacy in Two Languages was awarded the 2011 International Literacy Grant.  The goal of the project is provide elementary school teachers at CEDEI School, in Cuenca, Ecuador, with 1) professional development books on teaching reading and language arts in dual language programs and 2) high quality children's literature in English.  Faculty and administrators at The Centers for InterAmerican Studies, a U.S. based non-profit that grew out of the Augustana College Summer Spanish Program, began this school seven years ago, with a focus on pre-school education and special needs. Since then, a grade has been added each year and the school has grown to 114 students, including a 10% special needs student population, most of whom are blind.  The school is a trilingual school, with a focus on English, Spanish and French, and reflects in its curriculum the theme of global citizenship and justice. (www.cedei.org)  Those of us who dreamed of this school years ago gave much thought to the kinds of curriculum, pedagogies and leadership models we would want.  Currently, CEDEI School is a very effective teacher-led school, and we embrace an eclectic mix of Dewey, Freire, Nel Noddings, Deborah Meiers' small school approach, with project-based learning and inquiry-based learning as our guides. Our language curriculum is guided by the work of Jim Cummins, Sonia Soltero, and our multiculturalism is guided by Sonia Nieto, among others. We are unique in Ecuador, and teachers and scholars from around the region and the U.S. come to see education in action at CEDEI School.  Domestic visitors are interested in seeing, in particular, what we do with special needs students because, in Ecuador, special needs children are typically kept at home. We also have a strong social-emotional learning emphasis. We are a U.S. based 501C3 private school, and we are also committed to maintaining full scholarships for 25% of our students. Resources are scarce in Ecuador, however, and the average monthly salary for a public school teacher, for example, is less than $200 a month. Also, books can be quite expensive--often more expensive than in the U.S., and we have had to rely upon U.S. donations for quality children's literature. Our current library for the students is under 200 books and many of those are well-worn. We also have a great need for professional texts for teaching literacy, particularly in a multilingual setting.  For more information about the Guatemalan Schools Project, please contact Kathleen McInerney.

• Bhutan Family Literacy Puppet Project was awarded the 2010 International Literacy Grant.  The goal of the project is to increase children's motivation for learning and oral language development by giving preschoolers the chance to listen to quality children's literature, create puppets to pair with the stories they hear, and perform the stories in a tabletop theatre in front of peers and parents.  The Family Literacy Puppet Project will take place at a Montessori School in Bhutan, located in the eastern Himalayas.  As a country, Bhutan has experienced countless changes over the past few years.  With a new king, democracy, and constitutional monarchy, education has become one of the ten ministries that make up the new Bhutanese government.  Public education system is a fairly new concept in Bhutan.  Likewise novel in Bhutan is the early childhood model, which is imperative in the development of the country's educational plan.  The International Projects Committee feels that the work to be accomplished by the Family Literacy Puppet Project in Bhutan will be a positive step toward that country's educational mission.  With funds provided by this grant, teachers will work with at-risk families.  These families lack English proficiency skills and/or secondary education.  Chosen families will complete activities together in a literacy-based educational environment to earn books for their personal libraries that will continue strengthening at-home literacy exposure.  By utilizing the Internet and Flip Camcorders, video greetings will easily be sent between the Bhutanese Montessori students and cooperating Illinois public school students, thus mutually facilitating exposure to different cultures, languages, and customs.  These Bhutanese and American children will benefit from puppet performances recorded during class time with their respective teachers and parents.  It is hoped that Bhutanese children, using puppets and children's literature as part of their curriculum, will increase their oral language development and motivation for learning.  For more information about the Guatemalan Schools Project, please contact Carla Raynor.

• Literacy Bread Basket Project was awarded the 2009 IRC International Grant. Upon launch of the project, Jamaican classrooms will be partnered with classrooms in Illinois that have an interest in cross cultural exchanges.  The project will provide Jamaican classrooms opportunities to promote literacy strategies with good quality literature for children, help develop a professional resource library, to demonstrate several ways to conduct workshops for parents, to increase the use of technology for literacy activities, and to provide a Family Reading Festival. The overall goal is to improve the children's reading and writing performance.  For more information about the Literacy Bread Basket Project, please contact Jo Ann Karr.