Skyline One School, One Book
All Skyline families received a copy of Pie by Sarah Weeks to encourage reading as a life-long skill
The Skyline Elementary gymnasium was filled with students and Skyline staff on Friday, March 7th, to celebrate finishing their One School, One Book program. The students’ enthusiastic cheers echoed throughout space as if they were sitting front row at a game for their favorite sports team while they awaited the culminating activity: a pie eating contest.
This was the third year that Skyline participated in a school-wide classroom grant funded by the Elkhorn Public Schools Foundation called One School, One Book. This program provided a copy of the book, Pie by Sarah Weeks, to every family at Skyline.
Brynn Selk, third grade teacher and head of the One School, One Book planning committee, explained the benefits of this program. “One School, One Book promotes literacy, reading together as a family, and building a sense of community. It provides opportunities for families to spend time together and talk about a book,” she said. “It also allows teachers the opportunity to have class discussions on the book and incorporate it into daily lessons.”
When looking for a school-wide book, it can be difficult to find a book that appeals and is appropriate for all students, kindergarten through 5th grade. However, Sarah Weeks previously did an author visit at Skyline, and a fellow Elkhorn elementary school, Blue Sage, used Pie for their school and had a lot of fun.
“Sarah Weeks was a recent author visit for us and our students were so engaged during her presentation. She was wonderful to listen to,” Brynn said. “Sarah Yandell and I looked at themes from the book, possible activities, and decided it was a good fit for this year!”
The One School, One Book program kicked off at the end of January with a secret dress-up day where all staff wore cat or pie-themed items since those are big topics in the book. To help families during One School, One Book, a reading pacing guide with an ending date was sent home. Each week an activity was sent home that connected with that week’s reading. The activities included a cat coloring page, a writing prompt about what they would do if they won the top baking honor, create a recipe for “Skyline Pie”, write a thank you card to someone special, and compose a jingle. Students who completed all the activities got a raffle ticket to enter the pie eating contest. The final activity was an assembly featuring a staff pie eating contest.
The One School, One Book program kicked off at the end of January with a secret dress-up day where all staff wore cat or pie-themed items since those are big topics in the book. To help families during One School, One Book, a reading pacing guide with an ending date was sent home. Each week an activity was sent home that connected with that week’s reading. The activities included a cat coloring page, a writing prompt about what they would do if they won the top baking honor, create a recipe for “Skyline Pie”, write a thank you card to someone special, and compose a jingle. Students who completed all the activities got a raffle ticket to enter the pie eating contest. The final activity was an assembly featuring a staff pie eating contest.
“Students were super excited to get to feed an adult,” Brynn said.
The day of the assembly the students’ excitement was palpable in the gym. Principal Sarah Yandell read a short passage from the book to the gathered students and staff as the participants prepared for the pie eating contest. Six staff volunteers outfitted in garbage bags (one staff member even had a shower cap topped with a pie headband) sat at the table with a slice of pie in front of each of them. Behind each staff member was a student who would be feeding the staff their pie. The students were selected from a raffle of individuals who had completed all the book activities.
When Principal Yandell said “Go!”, the participating students frantically started feeding the pie to the staff member, and the gym erupted in cheers for the participants. It didn’t take long before there was a two-way tie that was solved with a classic game of rock paper scissors. The winning team, fourth grade teacher Jared Crawford and fourth grade student Lona, both received a shiny trophy for their pie eating victory.
This fun and engaging program was one of the 68 classroom grants that were approved for the 2024-2025 school year. “When community members donate to the Foundation, they are directly impacting students of Elkhorn!” Brynn said. “It is SO cool that every student at Skyline was able to read the same book.”
Classroom grants like One School, One Book show students that reading can be fun and for any age. Brynn noted, “Thank you for this grant and supporting us! Reading is one of my passions (personally and professionally) so being able to lead the committee for this grant is such an honor.”
