Kids set World Record for reading

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St. Isidore’s kids set a record for hitting the books this summer as the Danville school took part in the World Record for Reading program.

The students received their reading logs at the end of the school year and kept a daily log of minutes read throughout the summer. They placed sixth overall out of 8,725 schools that participated, landing them in the 2010 Book of World Records.

Fifth-grader Christine DeMartini was the top reader with 8,952 minutes, which calculates to approximately six days of non-stop reading or 150 hours.

Just behind her was eighth grader-Peter Tagliaferri with 8,095 minutes.

Christine says her favorite books are the Harry Potter series and Lemony Snickets, A Series of Unfortunate Events, and books by Cornelia Funke.

“I read so much because I had a lot of books I wanted to read this summer,” said Christine. “If you have a good book to read, reading is very fun.”

Lee Lewis, the school librarian, said the students’ success proves that St. Isidore School is a reading school and she is ready to go for the challenge again next year.

“St. Isidore School made history and the kids were thrilled to see their school listed in the world record,” said Lewis.

was the first time for the challenge and schools from all over the world participated, including from Japan, Ireland and China. California had the highest number of participating schools in the United States with 1,156, yet St. Isidore was the only one that placed in the top 20.

“Next year, I hope our school will get first place,” said Christine.

By Dolores Fox Ciardelli