It's 8:50 in the morning. The school bell has just rung. A discernable hush has enveloped Sunset View Elementary.
No one's talking. Not the janitors, the lunch cooks or the secretaries. Even visitors find themselves speechless for the next 15 minutes.But everything is normal.
Everyone is just reading.
It's the Drop Everything And Read program in action, said Alisa Morgan, school facilitator.
School officials decided to try the program after they read about it in a brochure at their summer retreat.
Since school started in July, the first 15 minutes of every school day has begun with reading time. And it includes everyone in the school - everyone!
Office secretaries turn off the phones and disappear into a good novel. Visitors are offered a seat and given magazines to read. Latecomers are stopped in the lobby to listen to the school librarian read a story.
The program is not totally without interaction. Sometimes the sixth-grade classes come into the first-grade classes to read together, and beginning readers often listen to stories being read. Older children are allowed to read with a buddy.
All over the building, there's a warm and comfortable quiet as busy minds explore a universe of words. The computers in the school media center stand by idle.
Individual reading material is usually "guided by interest." Anything from comics to a Dickens novel is OK, said Morgan.
"The important thing is that for that 15-minute interval, everybody is involved in some type of reading," she said. That works toward achieving the goals outlined in the school's mission statement, which includes helping students gain literary tools and acquiring a love of learning.
Principal Cindy Wright said the experiment has not only enhanced enjoyment of reading but has cut down on tardiness and effectively helped set a better learning tone for the entire day.
"It's an automatic attention getter. We find the students more focused for the teacher to begin. There's more of a calm feeling."
Wright said Sunset used to have at least 100 students late every day. Now it's down to a handful.
Fifth-grader Ian Bell said the reading interval helps him. "I like the reading. It's fun to read, and if you're mad, you can get into another whole world."
Cami Hofheins, also a fifth-grade student, said she doesn't read as many books at home because there's always too many other things going on.
"I like this because you can use your imagination," said Megan Sears, another fifth-grader.