LANSING, Mich. — For National Reading Month, LAFCU took its Listen & Learn Program into two elementary school classrooms. The featured attraction was cupcakes.
Partners for LAFCU Listen & Learn Crazy For Cupcakes were East Lansing Public Library and Red Cedar Elementary School, East Lansing; and Sweet Encounter Bakery, Lansing.
Via Zoom, Youth Services Librarian Gillian Streeter read the book, “If you Give a Cat a Cupcake,” written by Laura Numeroff and illustrated by Felicia Bond, to third and fourth grade students.
Sweet Encounter Bakery delivered cupcakes prior to the event, and bakery owner Nikki Thompson Frazier led students through a lesson via Zoom on how to decorate the cupcakes with cat faces inspired by the featured book. The bakery specializes in gluten- and peanut-free desserts.
“This is an excellent example of having fun when learning,” said Kelli Ellsworth Etchison, LAFCU chief marketing officer and chief diversity officer. “Thanks to our partners, the program offered new opportunities for the students to listen, read and interact, which all support engaged reading. Our future success depends on our youth, and their future depends on their ability to learn, create and imagine. This is why programs such as Listen & Learn are included in LAFCU’s community outreach.”
The event offered two surprises for the students to extend their learning: A book and an invitation for another free cupcake.
With help from the East Lansing library, LAFCU gave each student a copy of the graphic novel, “Yummy: A History of Desserts,” by Victoria Grace Elliott, to encourage continued reading. A coupon for a free cupcake at Sweet Encounter Bakery is available for students at the library as an incentive to visit and explore the library.
LAFCU said it created the Listen & Learn Program in response to the pandemic to provide a fun, new option for kids up to age 12 to learn, listen, read and interact.
In addition to live events, the LAFCU Listen & Learn Program offers recorded readings of children’s books on the credit union’s YouTube channel, http://bit.ly/LAFCU-L-L, and by phone, 517.622.6789. Volunteer readers are encouraged to sign up at https://bit.ly/LAFCUVolunteers.