Write It. Read It. Love It.

As you know by now, Jumpstart is a national early education organization that recruits and trains college students and community Corps members to serve preschool children in low-income neighborhoods. Our proven curriculum helps children develop the language and literacy skills they need to be ready for kindergarten, setting them on a path to close the achievement gap before it is too late. An essential part of what we do at Jumpstart DC at American University is read.  Our activities are all based around our core storybooks, each telling a different story for children to explore.  We will now be embarking on a 6-month project to create our own storybooks for our students to explore, read and love.

With your help, we will be creating a 12-15 story anthology, which will be self-published and distributed to the seven preschools classrooms Jumpstart DC at American University services.  These stories are meant to be unique.  They can be retelling of classic stories or your own original story!  Stories need to be written and illustrated on 8 ½ x 11 paper and can be submitted electronically or in person.  Submissions should be 50-1000 words.

These stories can be fiction or non-fiction.  Consider making a story about DC or about a 4-5 year old.
Some examples of stories are: “A Day with Jayden in Jumpstart,” “Alanah the Explorer” (playing off Dora the Explorer) , “Khayla and the Snake” (if your child likes snakes), Alphabet Book – theme the book around a particular theme.  You can also retell a classic story in your own words.

If you work with children (in Jumpstart or elsewhere), brainstorm about that child’s particular interests: what they like to play with?  What did they talk about most often?

Be sure to make it colorful with lots of pictures.  Children love colors and pictures!  Use characters and ideas your children can relate to.

If you would like to only author a story or illustrate, please let us know.  There will be several opportunities to do so!

The next round of submissions is due on September 1st.
 Other deadlines are:
~October 4th
~November 8th
Final Deadline: December 6th

For questions or to submit your story, please contact:
Stacia Jackson
Site Manager, Jumpstart DC at American University
On campus: Gray Hall 115
Email: staciaj@american.edu
Phone: 202.885.3157

The Stuff in the Office: My Year as the Jumpstart Program Assistant

A running conversation that I have with my site manager is along of the lines of, “How much stuff can you fit in here?” “Have we run out of space yet?” “Uh… where are we going to put these (insert item)?” To put it simply, the office has a lot of stuff in it.

Recently, Jumpstart helped host a service project with the School of Education here at AU. The service project was creating literacy kits for our partner children. Faculty and staff assembled blank books, coloring books, and wrapped new and donated children’s books. They even had a chance to write a small letter to the children receiving the books. From our office we pulled out, scissors for 8 tables, a few yards of tissue paper for wrapping, three balls of yarn, 16+ packets of foam stickers, at least 6 children’s letter writing kids, an assortment of crayons, markets, and metallic markers, and to top it all off—30 tote bags. The staff was amazed.

That was only the tip of the iceberg. Behind the door there are 6 dolphin piñatas because one of the core story books revolves around a girl who becomes attached to her dog piñata (and subsequently is unwilling to part with it). To the right of the door is a wall lined with the 14 purple Jansport backpacks that the team leaders use to carry all their session plan materials.

Further to the back of the office are 15 drawers full of session plan materials that range from mundane glue sticks to mini harmonicas. There is reason to the random chaos in those drawers. Jumpstart has a whole unit devoted to shadows and reflections, which explains the magnifying glasses, kaleidoscopes, metallic tissue paper, sunglasses, and mirror paper. Another unit is about the family, hence the draw full of baby dolls, baby bottles, and the boxes of plastic fruit (I can only imagine the faces of the front office when the box of babies came in the mail).

Being in the office is more than just sitting at the computer sending emails and making spreadsheets. All of this stuff (the 14 packs of crayons, 20 packs of markers, 6 dolphin piñatas, 14 purple backpacks, the 920+ children’s books) plays a vital and distinct role in children’s learning. Through preparing materials for sessions, inquiring about the seemingly peculiar purchases, and observing sessions, I can now see the bigger picture. That kaleidoscope just isn’t just a cool new thing to play with, but through play and meaningful interactions with adults it becomes a tool to connect real life with literature in order to build upon student comprehension.

After all my time in the office, I have come to the final conclusion that all this stuff… is more than just stuff.

-Lanny Pham
Program Assistant
Team Office