Highland County Public Schools Use a Bat Theme to Promote Literacy

Lynne Botkin, Title I Reading Specialist at Highland County Public Schools, had a really busy October planning and executing the school’s first literacy month with a batty celebration.

Botkin pulled in a variety of members from the community to help organize caving field trips for the upper elementary students and an entire bat-themed literacy night at the school. High school students from the art class created some decorations throughout the school, and a cave was even set up on the cafeteria stage for an interactive experience.

Clearly, this entire experience taught the students at Highland Elementary School a lot about bats in general:

Audio from kids at after school

That’s audio from the after school program at the Highland County Public Library. Elementary kids ride the bus to the library for an activity each week, and the library changed its schedule for the fall to accommodate the bat theme with two programs that integrated with the curriculum. The library also provided a Storywalk on the community walking trail for literacy month that incorporated the bat theme, Stellaluna by Janell Cannon.

And literacy month didn’t just cover literacy. Botkin worked hard to incorporate science and social studies concepts too. Because bats do play an important part in our ecosystems, and also our economies. They act as pollinators for some of your favorite tropical fruits -like agave fruit for tequila- and help keep pest populations low here in the U.S. 

Researcher Dave Waldien [Wall-Deen] even argues that bats are some of the most helpful species here in Virginia and beyond. After serving in the Army, Waldien went to college and spent a weekend on an assignment studying bats. It was over after that; he had fallen in love. 

“It’s just that diversity of what they do that intrigued me,” says Waldien. “Bats are saving farmers billions of dollars every year.”

Virginia also has its own state bat: the Virginia big-eared bat. It was designated by the legislature about 20 years ago, and while Waldien hasn’t seen the state bat in person, in part because of its endangered status, he said the name accurately describes them. 

“It’s got these huge ears, hence its name. It has a couple of lumps on its nose,” explains Waldien.

It’s fun to all learn something new together, so I hope you learned something with me about bats today to incorporate the literacy theme that your kids brought home all of last month as well!

Our thanks to Virginia Public Radio for their additions to this story.