Black Stallion Literacy Project

The Black Stallion Literacy Project is an innovative partnership of educators, librarians, businesses, and volunteers, focused on promoting literacy by using the magic of live horses and books by Walter Farley to spark the imagination of first grade students so they will want to learn to read, and to motivate fourth grade students so they will come to learn the joy of reading. While American Public Education is focused on basic reading comprehension to meet the requirements and legislation of No Child Left Behind, BSLP presents an alternative to teachers, students and school districts on how to meet these rigorous demands. Our project puts books in children's hands written by authors that have withstood the test of time. The current environment focuses children on paragraphs and short stories designed by test makers to improve comprehension. Children are not exposed to good literature and therefore do not have a motivation to continue reading. If children know how to read but don't read, it seems we have missed the entire point. Mark Twain’s succinct yet eloquent words, “The man who does not read books has no advantage over the man who cannot read them,” sum up one of the main concerns of our education system today that BSLP works tirelessly to alleviate.