SUSAN LOESCH
CATS IN THE STACKS

It is time for one of our year-end traditions, Accelerated Reader reading posters — which have turned the library into a photography studio!

Every year Big Footsie picked books in the AR program to become “Footsie’s Favorites.” For each of these that a student reads and passes the quiz on, their name goes on a paper cat that goes on the wall and they get a prize from Footsie. By this time of year the wall is pretty impressive, with colored cats stretching all the way back into the stacks. Footsie always liked to get up on the shelf and check them out.

We talked a little this year about whether, without Footsie, we should continue to call the books Footsie’s Favorites, and we decided that we would keep the name.

When questioned about how Footsie can still select books I tell the kids that he uses his “library cat magic” to let me know which books he chooses.

At the end of the year, each student who has read Footsie’s Favorites gets to create a reading poster. They choose which library cat wil join them in the photo, and they come up with their own caption.

I make these into big posters, which are handed out to the students at the last AR Rally of the year. This year we have 24 students who have earned posters; the number of Footsie’s Favorites read ranges from three to a whopping 73, with a total of more than 600!

Students have had the choice of Tank, Barney, Hexie, Shadow, or, if I already had pictures with them, Alex and SnuggleBunny, and all six cats will be featured in posters!
Yesterday I put a pink bandana on Barney because it matched what a couple of the girls were wearing. I totally meant to take it off before Mary or Trinity saw it, but I forgot until Mary came in, saw Barney, and sasked, “OK, what’s with the pink bandana?”

Off it came. Fast!

Today, Tank started out posing like a pro. By mid-morning, though, I was having to resort to feeding him treats to get him to stay put.

Or could it be that he just has me treat-trained?

There are always poster captions like “Reading is purrrfect” and “Library is fun” as well as the more thoughtful “Reading takes your mind on special adventures” and “Let reading take you around the world.”

One of this year’s captions is for sure destined to be my all-time favorite.

One of my fourth graders wants his picture taken with one-eyed Hexie when she comes tomorrow, and this is his caption: “It doesn’t matter if you have 1 eye or 2, reading is great!”