The 40 Excel By 5 communities across Mississippi have joined together to designate the week of July 22-28 as “Mississippi EXCELebrates Readiness By Reading,” giving early childhood -centered communities an opportunity to celebrate the importance of reading to young children.
In recognition of that designation, members of Petal Excel By 5 are actively engaging businesses, community members, parents, grandparents and guardians to read with children and host reading events throughout the community.
“Excel By 5 is all about children entering school healthy, happy and ready to be successful,” said Nadine Coleman, chair of the Excel By 5 Coalition. “We just thought that it would be another good opportunity for us to try to engage some of our businesses in the efforts.
“When people hear me talking about the importance of all these things, they know that’s been my work and my life, but it’s different when you hear it from people working at the bank or the grocery store or Walmart. And that’s really what Excel By 5 is all about – bringing the community together around this cause.”
Excel By 5 members are asking businesses or organizations that would like to host a reading event to contact the Petal Area Chamber of Commerce at (601) 583-3306 or send an email to info@petalchamber.com. Those organizations will be provided with a story book and a schedule for families to come to the business for story time.
Petal’s theme for this year’s Readiness By Reading is “Curious George Around Our Town.”
“Every community is going to be playing off their own theme, and we just see a lot of books about Curious George,” Coleman said. “So we’re ordering the books so that if children do come to the bank for story time, they’ll have a book about counting money and they can kind of tie it to the work that they do.
“It helps children have a better understanding of the community as a whole. Right now, we’re just trying to get people on board and then (later) we’ll come up with a schedule. We’re trying to locate a Curious George costume – we hope to have that in so the actual characters from the stories can make an appearance at the businesses as well.”
Interested parties also can participate in Readiness By Reading by making a donation to help purchase enough books for the event.
“I’m proud that the business community in Petal realizes the need to have children prepared for school and eventually the workforce,” said Valerie Wilson, executive director of the Petal Area Chamber of Commerce. “It’s incumbent to all of us to help promote and nurture reading readiness in children because we know that it is the cornerstone of future success.
“Reading is important because it develops the mind. The mind is a muscle; it needs exercise. Understanding the written work is one way the mind grows in its ability. Teaching young children to read helps them develop their language skills, and it also helps them to listen.”
Although this is the first time Petal Excel By 5 has participated in the event, Coleman said she has no doubt it will be successful.
“We certainly have had great support from the businesses here in Petal with our work,” she said. “We have sponsors every year that help us with our children’s concert, and when we have our big family events we get a lot of support from not only businesses, but of course from the school district and from the city as well.
“I have to say, we’re really fortunate that we’ve had such amazing support.”
