When reading, books can often take you to different places. Book Nooks serve as the perfect example of imagination brought to life hidden on a bookshelf. Book Nooks are made up of small dioramas or homes with extreme intricate detail that display another hidden world.  

“This project is the ideal, culminating project for Gifted and Talented students to apply what they learn about architecture, structures, and the design process in a collaborative, hands-on, project-based capacity,” said Amy Mitchelle, Frenship Gifted and Talented Teacher. 

This past year, the elementary Gifted and Talented programs across all eight Frenship elementary schools received a Teacher Grant from the Frenship Foundation to fund the Book Nook project initiative.  

The GT students have had the chance to put their science, technology, engineering, arts, and math skills to the test. These Book Nook kits have provided students with career exposure and further knowledge and skills of building a structure using the engineering design process. 

“We had to use a lot of teamwork to create the book nooks,” said Kaylyn Gillman, North Ridge Gifted and Talented student. “Whenever you read a book, you have an idea in your head of what it would look like, and our book nooks helped show that. In the sunshine town book nook, it had a small cafe, lots of plants, and a cat. It looked like a happy place to go.” 

The North Ridge GT students divided up into groups to create four book nooks. There was a sunshine town with a coffee and book shop located in a quaint cottage town square. The next book nook was a magic house, which resembled a mysterious magic shop located on a dark eerie street. The third book nook was a train station surrounded by beautiful Japanese cherry blossoms. The last book was time travel themed with a train ready to pick up passengers to journey through different decades.  

North Ridge Gifted and Talented student, Christian Armendariz, enjoyed the electrical element of the project.  

"My favorite part was when we did the electrical writing. It wasn’t as hard as I thought it was going to be, even though we had to get all the wires through a lot of little holes to connect,” said Armendariz.  

William Stephens, another student in the North Ridge Gifted and Talented class liked connecting the structure walls. Even through challenges, he was able to use his critical thinking skills to find a solution.  

“My favorite part was bolting in the sides together because every time that I would mess up the screws would fall somewhere. I had a little bit of a challenge and fun trying to find the screws,” said Stephens.  

Once all the book nooks were complete the students visited the library where they picked out different sections for their book nooks to live on.  

“We chose to put our book nook in the sci-fi section because it was about time travel,” said Greg Wu, North Ridge Gifted and Talented student. 

Cade Ure, North Ridge Gifted and Talented student, said, “We put our book nook in the fantasy section because as soon as we saw it finished, we thought it looked similar to Harry Potter.” 

One of the groups found their book nook home in the comedy section of the library because they believed that it looked bright and welcoming.  

“We put ours in the comedy section because it was happy and fun looking,” said Nory Torres, North Ridge Gifted and Talented student.  

The detailed book nooks not only gave students the opportunity to gain valuable strategic development skills, but also allowed them to gain more emotional intelligence when working together as a group.  

“My favorite part was when our team went through struggles because I like figuring out ways to get our house put back together and make it work,” said Brooklynn Duncan, North Ridge Gifted and Talented student. 

Frenship Gifted and Talented Teacher Julie Williamson is happy with how the projects turned out and is proud of what her students learned throughout the process. 

“It was a really great project because the main thing we focused on was teamwork, collaboration, and learning to work together through challenges. We now have a really great project to live on at the school,” said Williamson.  

The Frenship Foundation Teacher Grant Application is currently open for Frenship educators to apply for. The deadline to submit the online application is June 5, 2024. All teaching and instructional staff can apply. Teachers must complete all application tasks including getting principal approval before the June 5th deadline.