Bushnell First Grade Class Earns Top Honors Bowl in Michigan ReadBowl

Her students read over 60,000 minutes, over a five-week period, an impressive feat. The ReadBowl is part of the Share the Magic Foundation. Started in 2016 by Malcom Mitchell, a former NFL player who played for the New England Patriots, the ReadBowl has motivated thousands of students across the globe. 

By Bill Lee || Contributing writer

3/5/2024

Elementary school teacher, Emma Bailey, has had her classes compete in the ReadBowl - a global reading competition for elementary students - for the last four years, when she taught in Greenville. Her students there performed well but were not able to win any awards for their efforts. This January, in only her first year at Bushnell Elementary School in Lowell, Bailey’s first grade students, not only exceeded her expectations in the competition, but they actually won first place in the state of Michigan and ranked 28th in the entire country.

Her students read over 60,000 minutes, over a five-week period, an impressive feat. The ReadBowl is part of the Share the Magic Foundation. Started in 2016 by Malcom Mitchell, a former NFL player who played for the New England Patriots, the ReadBowl has motivated thousands of students across the globe.  According to their website, the program “has been dedicated to transforming the lives of children through literacy. Through our In-School, Virtual, and Community Partner Programs, a love of reading is ignited in thousands of kids.”

Bailey was not only inspired by Malcolm Mitchell’s goals for young children, she has seen how the ReadBowl program really motivates young children to read as much as they can.  “Malcolm had a goal in life to help kids who struggled to read and find a love for reading because he struggled with reading throughout his educational career, so he wanted to change the way for kids,” said Bailey. “He created different competitions, several times throughout the year, and we participated in the ReadBowl. The challenge was to read as many minutes as you could in each quarter. A quarter was a week of time. He allowed for in-class minutes and at-home minutes to count. And my kids read so much. It was crazy.  They turned in a reading log and we submitted it each quarter. And what was really cool about his program was that after we submitted our minutes, we were given a ‘code to the locker room,’ is what they called it. And it unlocked videos from current NFL players talking to the class to encourage them to read and talk about their reading journeys as a kid.”

Other NFL players who have played a role in the ReadBowl are Chris Conley, Julian Edelman and Tre Tarpley. Other celebrities that have taken part in it are Jeff Kinney (author of Diary of a Wimpy Kid) and Usher, who recently performed at halftime at the Super Bowl. The Bushnell first graders completed most of their reading before the Super Bowl, so Bailey gave them an idea of who Usher actually was. “The kids were like ‘Who’s Usher?’” said Bailey. “The video [of Usher speaking to the children] took place in January. It was before the Super Bowl so it led up to it, so the students were able to draw the connection and thought it was really cool. And in their first-grade world, nobody else is getting these videos. They think it is just for them, so it was really cool for them.”

Because they came in first-place in the state, the students did receive a special video from Malcom Mitchell himself, and also Bushnell Elementary will eventually receive a bunch of new books from Scholastic Publishing. Another reason why Bailey loves the ReadBowl is because it is inclusive to students from many different backgrounds and skills.  “Something that I valued is that some students don’t have that home support to be able fill-out a reading log, but they were still able to participate based on their in-class minutes,” said Bailey. “It was inclusive to everybody in the room; nobody was left out.”

In a short amount of time, it is clear that Bailey has made a difference with our children in Lowell. She is a teacher who loves her job and her community. “I love it,” said Bailey. “I’m so happy I landed in Lowell. I love the community and just how much everybody is so invested in taking care of each other.”