Hurricane Harvey Book Club Helps With Disaster Recovery In A Unique Way

By Carie P.

Houston has been hit by Hurricane Harvey and the aftermath of the disaster is very evident prompting the Americans to help in their own ways. Many people even from afar are driven to act like donating money to charities and organizations, sending important supplies and even offering their own homes as shelter due to the floods. But one teacher initiated a certain movement called "Hurricane Harvey Book Club" which functions to help with disaster relief through words.

For a teacher, she might ask people to help through books and words like Kathryn Butler Mills, a second-grade teacher from Katy, Texas. According to Today, she woke up Sunday morning and what she witnessed was a devastated community. Then she shared on social media that she saw some of her past and present students sitting under staircases or in bathrooms waiting out for tornado warnings.

Because of what she witnesses, Mills added that her heart ached for the children aged below 10 and she wanted to make a way to bring a little normal to them in a very not normal situation. After this, she also observed that a lot of the kids were reading that's why she thought of having the kids record themselves reading for their classmates.

Then on Sunday, Mills initiate the Hurricane Harvey Book Club and she started the inviting 70 local families to join the group on Facebook. With this, she asked the children to record videos of themselves reading aloud so that those who had no books within reach in the floods can listen to them too.

Then last Tuesday, latest reports from Vox claimed that the Hurricane Harvey Book Club has swelled to over 7,000 members and even growing. As of now, there are over 300 videos posted on the site and this even went beyond the expectation of Mills.

Regarding how this works and develops, anyone in the group can post a video reading a children's book and most of the participants are children from the flood-stricken areas. Apart from giving the kids something fun to do, this can also give comfort to other children in same situations and circumstances.