Author visit shows fun side of reading

Published 8:04 am Friday, October 15, 2010

Illustrator Derek Anderson draws Hot Rod Hamster for Neveln second-graders during a visit Thursday. - Eric Johnson/photodesk@austindailyherald.com

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As Derek Anderson spoke to second-graders at Neveln Elementary School Tuesday, he pointed out all of the instances in some of the children’s books he’s written where he snuck in a drawing of his most famous illustration, Little Quack.

“Can I do that?” he asked his audience.

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“Yes!” they shouted in reply.

“Of course I can! I can do anything I want in my book,” Anderson told the second graders.

Anderson, an award-winning children’s author and illustrator, toured Austin Public School’s elementary buildings this week giving presentations to first through fifth graders on how they can achieve their dreams.

“I tell kids, ‘Just because something’s hard, doesn’t mean it’s not worth doing,’” Anderson said.

Neveln second-grader Hannah Stewart watches in anticipation as illustrator Derek Anderson draws Hot Rod Hamster during his presentation Thursday. - Eric Johnson/photodesk@austindailyherald.com

He is one of the visiting authors and lecturers that come yearly to the elementary schools, among many extra-educational opportunities thought up by district teachers and staff and paid for by groups like each elementary school’s Parent Teacher Committees as well as Austin’s Public Education Foundation.

It’s opportunities like these that excite kids, according to Neveln Principal Dewey Schara.

“The whole concept of writing and reading becomes tangible,” Schara said. “It excites kids about reading when they see the author who wrote that book, right there, and know the concept is tangible.”

That’s why groups like the Public Education Foundation give out grants to teachers and staff who apply for them to bring in people like Anderson, or fund field trips and other outside-the-box opportunities for students.

According to Erin Schoen, one of the members of the PEF and a teacher at Southgate Elementary School, the PEF gave a record $30,000 in grants to district teachers for this school year, for projects like a new sound system for the Austin High School dance team, or a new library at the Community Learning Center and presentations just like Anderson’s.

“This is just something that…they can enrich their classrooms with,” Schoen said.

Many area PTCs do their part to help fund extra-educational opportunities as well. According to Dannielle Borgerson-Nesvold, the treasure for Southgate’s PTC, usually about three field trips per grade level at Southgate are funded through the PTC every year, including a trip for every grade to the Jay C. Hormel Nature Center, which designs different lessons for each grade every year.

“We basically support the teachers and the staff and the students by getting the funds for their projects,” Borgerson-Nesvold said.