Students from Heather Lozano’s fourth-grade shared their love of monsters with a class in Safford via videoconferencing Tuesday.

Through the Read Across Arizona program open to K-12 students, Saddleback Elementary School students connected with fourth graders at Dorothy Stinson Elementary for an hour exchanging information about their schools and communities.

“Read Across Arizona promotes collaborative work, distant learning, literacy, and reading,” Lozano said. “It’s a great exercise to keep students engaged.”

The Safford students read “Stella Luna,” while Lozano’s class followed with a reading activity based off the book “Go Away Big Green Monster!” Each student read a description of their monster.

The students in Stafford listened and drew their own monster based on those descriptions. When they were finished, each student in Stafford got to show the students in Maricopa their drawings.

“My favorite part was sharing our monsters,” said Jose Miguel Ramirez Jr., a Saddleback student.

“Read across Arizona” is in its 7th year.

“It does take some time and planning but it is a great tool for students and teachers to take advantage of,” Lozano said. “I hope to register my classroom in Read across the Planet, which connects students around the world.”

Registration for Read Across the Planet starts in December.