Past projects 21
Middle Grade Books for the Middle School Curious
Funded Apr 9, 2025Hooray! You did it again! These books will be a wonderful surprise for our students, keeping them excited about reading as the school year wraps up and they get ready for fifth grade. And they will be enjoyed by fourth graders for many years to come. Can’t wait to give our classroom library a spring glowup. Thank you for supporting public schools and student book choice!”
With gratitude,
Ms. Berenblum
This classroom project was brought to life by The DonorsChoose Community and 16 other donors.Books for Every Reader/Libros Para Todos
Funded Oct 4, 2024We are delighted to be able to offer our class a refreshed library. Our Spanish-speaking newcomers will now have access to some of the titles they have been wanting to read (like Guts and The Babysitters Club), which we currently only have in English. Other kids who are just getting going with chapter-book series will be happy to discover many new series to choose from. And all our animal-lovers will be thrilled to read through the complete Who Would Win? Series.”
With gratitude,
Ms. Berenblum
This classroom project was brought to life by SONIC Foundation and 22 other donors.Book Baggies For Beginning Readers!
Funded Dec 13, 2023This project will bring joy to new readers and their families. I can’t wait to be able to send home lots of books for kids to enjoy in bed, at the breakfast table, or even on their commute to school. Now that we will have durable baggies, the kids can take books with them wherever they go!”
With gratitude,
Ms. Berenblum
It's a Bench! It's a Library! It's Flexible Seating!
Funded Jun 20, 2023Hooray! New benches will soon be on their way! We are delighted to be able to offer our first graders a fully-functional, developmentally-appropriate space that works with our curriculum. Thank you for helping us transcend the limitations of our small room with multipurpose furniture. We truly appreciate your kindness.”
With gratitude,
Ms. Berenblum
This classroom project was brought to life by An Anonymous Supporter and 8 other donors.Supply Tubs!
Funded May 21, 2023Thank you for these beautiful material bins! My students love taking care of their classroom space. We have “materials managers” who are responsible for filling their table’s basket with supplies from our supply station. These clear bins will make their job so much easier and more enjoyable, and help protect our materials from dust even when the windows are open. Little things make a big difference in a busy school day. Thank you!”
With gratitude,
Ms. Berenblum
Decodable Books for Developing Readers!
Funded Mar 31, 2023Wow, thank you for funding this project in one day. That’s a record for me, and will help us get these books into kids’ book baggies lickety-split. They will be ordered today and some might even arrive before the April break. This project effectively doubles our decodable-book library. So exciting!”
With gratitude,
Ms. Berenblum
This classroom project was brought to life by The DonorsChoose Community and 10 other donors.Read-to-Me (In The 21st Century)
Funded Oct 21, 2021The books you brought to our classroom are front and center in our space, and they are front and center in the children's day. From the moment they finish unpacking in the morning, kids are at the picture-book library scanning the spines for this or that favorite. This week, the most popular books were by the author Jory John, who makes them laugh and makes them think, too. Having lots of Jory John titles in our library made it easy for kids to pull them all out onto the rug and compare characters and series. They noticed that John has authored four of their favorite picture-book series, which led to lots of interesting discussion. I wonder what they will be into next week. We have enough new, wonderful titles to sustain their interest for many weeks to come. Some of the books are pretty advanced and we thought we would need families to read them aloud to their kids at bedtime, but the kids quickly figured out that they can hear the story more quickly by asking one another "will you read this to me?" What a lovely way to support their emerging identities as readers and community-members. Thank you for the countless hours of enjoyment you have provided us.”
With gratitude,
Ms. Berenblum
This classroom project was brought to life by Dollar General Literacy Foundation and 19 other donors.Less Clanging, More Calm
Funded Oct 24, 2021The sound-reduction headphones have been a big success! As you know, my first graders have been learning to read in a busy classroom, with the windows open (above an expressway!) and two large air purifiers humming away. It was hard for them to concentrate with all that noise, until the noise-cancelling headphones came in. Now they are able to decide if the noise level is too much, and will pop up throughout the day to go fetch the headphones with their name on them. It is wonderful to see them taking ownership of their learning conditions and starting to tune in to their own need for concentration. Thank you so much for making those moments possible, and for all the calm learning that has come about as a result!”
With gratitude,
Ms. Berenblum
Book Totes 2.0!
Funded Oct 25, 2020The pandemic has been hard on kids. Spending their whole remote schoolday on screens, they were sick of reading that way, too. But it was tricky for us to get books to them from school. These books totes made it possible for each child in our class to receive a bag of books selected for them. We customized the bags from our classroom library based on each child's reading interests. Parent volunteers managed the distribution. And each child was able to decorate their book tote with fabric markers, sharing their unique reading identity on the tote. Thank you so much for making this fun community effort possible. I don't know what parts of remote schooling my students will remember, but I think receiving paper-and-ink books will be a memory they cherish.”
With gratitude,
Ms. Berenblum
A Classroom That's Just Their Size!
Funded Sep 14, 2021The children feel at home in their first grade classroom, thanks to you. They have been so happy sitting at the little round tables, which are just the right size for sitting next to their math partners. The large hollow blocks have been used to create all kinds of classroom furniture, such as additional mini tables for partner work, seats for the meeting area, and shelters for rest time. The kids have been building with the new Legos, too. Even though the first group to work with them tore open all the little numbered baggies that separated pieces for different "builds" in the instruction manual, kids have been working together to find the pieces they need to complete each mini build. They even asked for magnifying glasses to help them locate the smaller pieces needed to build a schoolbus from the manual. We are still waiting for the easels to arrive, and when they do we will bring out tempera paint and big brushes and the children who love art most will have a ball. Thank you so much for your kind donations. They really helped bring our dream classroom to life.”
With gratitude,
Ms. Berenblum