Day 358 (Not So Empty Again) - Hungry Reading Caterpillars

Every summer the Box Elder County Literacy Program offers a "Stay on Track" Summer Reading Program to help kids who are a little behind on their reading skills.  For the past four years, I've volunteered to be a tutor for the program and I've met some of the cutest little kids!

As tutors, we are basically encouraged to make it fun for the kids, so twice a week (since the first week of June) I've met with two cute girls and we have played reading games and I've offered them reading incentives to read at home.  I figure I can't really help them much with just two days a week (some weeks we didn't even meet at all with vacations and such) but if I can get them to read at home each night that will make a BIG difference!  This year my reading incentive was "Hungry Caterpillars".  For every 10 minutes they read at home they earned a link on their caterpillar; for every 10 links on their caterpillar, they got to pick out some caterpillar food (aka...a treat!)  My girls loved the caterpillars (and the treats)!

Since today was my last tutoring session for the summer, I sent them on a caterpillar treasure hunt through the library.  I had two cute little girls scurrying through the library finding caterpillar clues which eventually led them to a hidden treasure (they searched at different times, of course!).  They were both sooo excited!  And the best part for me was the hug I received at the end.  That made my whole summer!