Third graders at Minot Forest Elementary School are going to expand their vocabularies thanks to the Wareham Elks Lodge’s Dictionary Project, which gives each student his or her own dictionary.
"It’s like you’re giving them bicycles," said Exalted Ruler Susan Gifford, noting the excitement of the children. Fellow Elks George Spencer, Melody Gifford, Yelena Beaupre, and John Altimas were on-hand to help Gifford hand out the dictionaries on Friday, November 4.
The Dictionary Project was founded in 1995 to promote literacy among children in the third grade as they move from learning to read to identifying and using information.
The children will get to keep their dictionaries, and the Elks will return next school year to give the new third-grade class a set of dictionaries.
The Wareham Elks Lodge has completed the project once before under Gifford. This school year, the Elks have donated to the John W. Decas and Minot Forest schools in Wareham, St. Margaret’s in Buzzards Bay, and to the Bournedale and Peebles elementary schools in Bourne.