Photo by Deb Gau Third grade students at Southview Elementary page through their new dictionaries on Friday afternoon. Members of the Marshall Noon Rotary visited Marshall schools to give dictionaries to all third grade classes. Club members helped distribute 250 dictionaries in Marshall and Lynd this year.

MARSHALL — Third graders at Marshall schools got a special gift on Friday. Members of the Marshall Noon Rotary visited classrooms to hand out dictionaries to each student.

“It gets to be your book. It even has your name in it,” Matt Pedersen said, as he and Molly Archbold spoke with a third grade class at Southview Elementary on Friday afternoon.

Rotarians helped teach students how to use their dictionaries, by having them look up the meanings of a couple of key words. One was “tiger,” for the Marshall Tiger mascot. Students also looked up the word “service.”

“Service. The act of helping others,” one student read to their class.

Rotary member Paul Stoneberg explained that service was an important word for the Rotary Club. Among the service projects that Marshall Rotarians work on include efforts to build reading and writing skills for area kids.

“We want to help build up your vocabulary,” Stoneberg told students.

The Noon Rotary has given dictionaries to third grade students for more than 20 years, Stoneberg estimated. This year, the group distributed about 250 dictionaries to third grade students at public and private schools in Marshall and Lynd.