On April 12, Castle Heights Elementary celebrated their second annual Knights Festival with a multitude of games, prizes and activities. Students were brought down by their individual grades to enjoy the festivities and celebrate all of their hard work.
Renee Pressett, who is the Instructional Coach and Reading Specialist For Castle Heights Elementary, is also one of the brains behind the “Knights Festival”. Pressett, along with teachers and administration, wanted to come up with something fun for the kids to motivate them to read.
“Reading is so important to kids’ long-term success in life, so we want to do everything we can to make them strong readers right now,” stated Pressett.
Throughout the year, students are given reading and math challenges to earn Knights coins. Each grade is given specific challenges according to their grade level as an opportunity to earn those coins. At the end of the year students have a chance to spend their coins at the “Knights Festival”. Some of the activities to choose from were bounce houses, face painting, snow cones and “jousting” among many, many, other things.
Fourth graders created their own Feudal System, with all of them starting out as “Serfs” and earning their way up the Royal Hierarchy. Many of the students were able to work their way up to Lords, Princesses, Princes, Kings and Queens.
Emma Van Der Spek, who is the Coordinator for USU Eastern Upward Bound Program, spoke on the event. Van Der Spek said a few students from Carbon High School were volunteering at the “Knights Festival” as part of their community service. Upward Bound is a program that USU Eastern offers to high school students to get them involved in community service projects as an opportunity to build their resumes for college applications.
“A really good way to get scholarships is by doing community service, and then they also get to give back to their communities,” stated Van Der Spek.
To find out more information on the Upward Bound Program visit their webpage at: https://eastern.usu.edu/upward-bound/
