Over the summer, Marymount University faculty hosted the inaugural session of the Camp Santos: Rec N’ Read program, a three-week summer camp designed to improve bilingual literacy skills among elementary school children in Arlington.
The program was created by Dr. Ella Merriwether, Assistant Professor of Forensic and Legal Psychology in the Marymount School of Social and Behavioral Sciences, and Dr. Megan Mahowald, Professor in the School of Health Sciences’ new Speech-Language Pathology program.
The program seeks to help children improve their reading and writing skills in both English and Spanish by combining literacy activities with games, crafts and recreation. The framework is based on a model developed a decade ago by Dr. Mahowald while she was living and working in Minnesota.
“A lot of children who are learning English in schools don’t receive bilingual instruction,” she explained. “But research shows that second-language learning success depends on having a strong first-language foundation. This means that English is easier to learn when the child has a strong grasp of Spanish, and vice versa. That’s why we emphasize reading, writing and language development in both English and Spanish.”
Dr. Mahowald and Dr. Merriwether joined forces to adapt the framework to fit the needs of the Arlington community, which has a large Hispanic population and children who are being raised bilingual.
“We’re particularly focused on children who struggle to learn to read and write, those with developmental delays or disabilities and bilingual children—whether they’re primarily Spanish speakers learning English, or English speakers learning Spanish,” Dr. Merriwether said. “Our goal is not only to build language and literacy, but also to strengthen children’s self-efficacy—their confidence in themselves as learners, readers and writers, and their confidence in their cultural identity.”
This year’s pilot program launched in July, running for three consecutive weeks and serving 15 children in the Arlington community. Each session had its own theme, like “Our Families” or “Our Stories,” and was centered around a bilingual “anchor book” that the children could learn to connect to their own lives. Reading and writing activities including word work, readers theater and read alouds. Dr. Merriwether and Dr. Mahowald used their Marymount resources to help create a positive experience for the kids.
“We partnered with Gwen Vredevoogd at Marymount’s Library for a field trip to explore the children’s section, during which the students could select their own books to read,” Dr. Mahowald added. “We also tried to send books home for the children to read during the summer. A growing problem among elementary school kids is ‘summer learning loss,’ when children fall behind in what they are learning in the classroom due to lack of practice. Research shows that simply having access to books at home can reduce summer learning loss, so that was something we emphasized.”
Teaching alongside the professors were Marymount students who had bilingual backgrounds and a strong connection to their Hispanic heritage.
“Dr. Mahowald and I are very aware of the need for kids to see the language modeled in an authentic and relevant way,” Dr. Merriwether explained. “Neither of us are native Spanish speakers, so tapping into the amazing Latine population here on campus was a great way for us to find instructors who could relate to the kids from a cultural perspective.”
Junior Alessandra Sierra Gonzalez, an Elementary Education major with Ecuadorian heritage, was one of the students who served as a counselor for all three Camp Santos sessions.
“Being a part of Camp Santos was such a fun and rewarding experience,” Sierra Gonzalez said. “I got to mentor kids, build relationships and help them grow academically and socially. It was so cute to see how excited they were about the activities and how much they progressed from the beginning of camp to the end.”
Despite the camp’s short timeframe, organizers saw improvement in the children’s reading and writing as well as their confidence.
“Some children who were nervous or resistant at first were volunteering and beaming with pride by the end,” Dr. Merriwether said. “We saw them making real connections between vocabulary sets and understanding grammar and word patterns in both languages. That transformation is why we’re so passionate about growing this program.”
Dr. Mahowald and Dr. Merriwether plan to synthesize their research findings and present them at the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association (ASHA) Conference, which will be held in Washington, D.C., this November. They also hope to launch an expanded Camp Santos: Rec N’ Read next year, holding more sessions and welcoming more community members to increase their impact.
“What’s so amazing about this project is that it not only serves the community, but also acts as a powerful training ground for our students,” Dr. Mahowald reflected. “It’s really two-fold. The children get the support they need in their literacy journey, while our Marymount students learn how to be compassionate and skilled professionals.”
