Alicia Brandes, a teaching assistant at Lake Placid Elementary School, reads “We Don’t Eat Our Classmates” to the kindergarten class on Tuesday, Sept. 13. Each student took home a copy of the book thanks to a book club Brandes started to give away a book a month to each of the school’s students. (News photo — Lauren Yates)

LAKE PLACID — Around 45 kindergarten students sat on the floor, legs crossed, and surrounded Alicia Brandes as she read the book, “We Don’t Eat Our Classmates,” by Ryan T. Higgins.

“Penelope Rex was nervous,” the teaching assistant read Tuesday afternoon, Sept. 13 at the Lake Placid Elementary School. “It’s not every day a little T. rex starts school.”

It’s a story about making friends that centers around a young dinosaur who’s just trying to fit in at school — if only she could stop eating her classmates.

“Penelope Rex was very surprised to find out that all of her classmates were CHILDREN! So she ate them. Because children are delicious.”

The book teaches students about good behavior and making friends.

Lake Placid Elementary School kindergarten students use their fingers to count to 10 on Tuesday, Sept. 13. That’s the number of books she they will receive this school year as a part of the Mary Kelley Book Club set up by teaching assistant Alicia Brandes. (News photo — Lauren Yates)

“‘Penelope Rex!’ said Mrs. Noodleman. ‘WE DON’T EAT OUR CLASSMATES! Please spit them out at once!'”

At school’s end on Tuesday, all the Lake Placid kindergarteners left with the book in their backpacks. It was the first of 10 books Brandes will give away to each kindergartner for every month of the school year as part of a book club she started a couple of years ago. At the time, while teaching Pre-K at St. Agnes School, she saw that some teachers were looking for “book fairies” on social media — people to donate money that would be used to purchase books for students. Brandes decided to make her own posts on social media with the idea that a donation of $10 could sponsor one student for an entire school year — one dollar to buy one book for every month of the school year.

After seeing success in the book club’s first year, Brandes carried the idea over to Lake Placid Elementary School when she started working there last year. She wanted to collect money to sponsor the entire kindergarten class, but the donations exceeded her expectations. She had enough money to expand the book club and give books to second graders for the whole year. This year, Brandes is aiming even higher. She wants to raise enough money to buy 10 books for every student in kindergarten through grade 5.

Scholastic, a grade school-oriented publisher and distributor of children’s books, has a different book available for $1 every month. When Brandes buys books from Scholastic in bulk, Scholastic rewards her with discounts. Last year, Brandes said she collected around $550 for the book club, but with the discounts, she was able to buy around 1,000 books. If she collects $1,000 for books this year, she might be able to buy around 2,000 books. Brandes knows that’s a lot of money, but she said the Lake Placid community is generous. If she can’t get enough money to buy books for all the school’s students, she’d start with the youngest students and work her way up through the classes.

Brandes believes it’s important to read with children while they’re young to foster a love of reading and learning, and she said research has shown that reading to kids while they’re young boosts their success in school. She has memories of her parents reading to her every night before bed, a tradition she carried on with her own four children. She said the benefits of reading to children are evident in her children, who are now between 19 and 27 years old.

Lake Placid Elementary School kindergarten student Mariah Sears uses her fingers to count to 10 on Tuesday, Sept. 13. That’s the number of books she and other kindergarteners will receive this school year as a part of the Mary Kelley Book Club set up by teaching assistant Alicia Brandes. (News photo — Lauren Yates)

“I think it helped them become early readers, and they are voracious readers — more so than I myself,” she said.

Times are getting harder for some parents, some of whom have dealt with unemployment and financial stress during the coronavirus pandemic. Brandes said not every parent in the Lake Placid school district can buy books for their students, and she hopes that the book club could lift some of that financial burden.

But why buy all these books for students when they could read the books for free at the local library? Brandes said that while the library is a great resource, owning a book is a special experience for young students.

Brandes is also a bus monitor on the Wilmington-routed bus, and she said it’s been “really cool” to see students pull their book club books out of their backpack to read on the long ride.

This year, Brandes has decided to name the book club the “Mary Kelley Book Club” to memorialize Mary Kelley, a beloved second and fourth-grade teacher who taught at LPES for 37 years. Kelley, who died last year, is well-remembered for her love of learning and reading books to students. Brandes said Kelley’s impact in the school district is still felt by many who knew her.

Lake Placid Elementary School kindergarten students listen to teaching assistant Alicia Brandes read “We Don’t Eat Our Classmates,” by Ryan T. Higgins, on Tuesday, Sept. 13. (News photo — Lauren Yates)

“Although she did not teach these students in elementary school, she taught a lot of their parents,” Brandes said.

A bookshelf at LPES was dedicated to Kelley on her birthday in September of last year, and this year’s first round of book club giveaways was this Tuesday — about a week after Kelley’s birthday on Sept. 7.

In the cover of each book was the name of a student and a stamp with a four-leaf clover and the words “In honor of Mrs. McKelley.” The stamp is a nod to Kelley’s “proud” Irish heritage, according to Brandes. The nickname is a hybrid between Kelley’s married name and her Irish maiden name, McCarthy.

“She truly believes in the luck of the Irish,” Brandes said of Kelley.

Kindergarteners were surprised to hear that they’d be taking “We Don’t Eat Our Classmates” home on Tuesday and that their names would be written in the books.

A Lake Placid Elementary School kindergartener watches Tuesday, Sept. 13 as teaching assistant Alicia Brandes writes his name in a book. It was the first of 10 books that he’ll receive as part of the Mary Kelley Book Club, which aims to give every student one book for each month they’re in school. (News photo — Lauren Yates)

“Are we going to get to keep the books?” one kindergartener asked.

That’s a question Brandes has been asked before. She said students get excited when they learn that they’ll be the owners of their book club books. In turn, Brandes encourages the kids to read their new books to their siblings, to ask their parents to read to them, or even to read to a stuffed animal. She said that reading just a few minutes a day can vastly improve a young student’s vocabulary.

As Brandes read “We Don’t Eat Our Classmates,” she explained that Penelope Rex couldn’t stop eating her classmates.

“And they were all afraid of her,” Brandes said. “Except Walter. … Walter was a goldfish.”

When Penelope put a finger in Walter’s bowl, asking if he would be her friend, he bit her. And that’s the moment she lost her appetite for children and began making friends.

Alicia Brandes, a teaching assistant at Lake Placid Elementary School, reads "We Don't Eat Our Classmates" — the first of 10 books she'll give away to kindergarteners this year — to the kindergarten class on Tuesday, Sept. 13. (News photo — Lauren Yates)

“Now, even when children look especially delicious, she peeks at Walter and remembers what it’s like when someone tries to eat you.

“And Walter, the goldfish, stares right back at her and licks his lips.

“Because dinosaurs are delicious.”

A bulletin board at Lake Placid Elementary School is seen here Tuesday, Sept. 13 with kindergarteners' art projects that were inspired by the book "We Don't Eat Our Classmates" — the first of 10 books the students will receive this year as part of Alicia Brandes's Mary Kelley Book Club. (News photo — Lauren Yates)