For families & students
Read more.
Laugh more.
Be a Wacky Reader.
Your child’s classroom and your local SONIC have teamed up to celebrate awesome readers. Here’s what the certificate coming home in the backpack means.
How your child earns a treat
Three steps
1
Read
Complete the reading goal your child’s teacher set for the classroom or individual student — minutes, pages, chapters, books or skill target.
2
Earn
The teacher awards a Wacky Reader certificate. It comes home in the folder or backpack.
3
Enjoy
Bring the certificate to a participating SONIC Drive-In and redeem it for a free Wacky Pack Kids Meal.
✓ The certificate is the coupon. No app, code or printout needed — just hand the paper certificate to the crew.
✓ Good through July 31, 2027. There’s no rush; certificates earned in the spring are still valid all summer.
✓ Redeem at participating SONIC Drive-Ins. Valid at participating locations in the Umstattd Sonic Group family of restaurants.
✓ One free Wacky Pack Kids Meal per certificate. Your child chooses their Wacky Pack at the drive-in.
✓ Nothing to buy, ever. There is no purchase requirement to earn or redeem a certificate.
What parents need to know
Certificate details
The goal is the habit, not the prize. A few things that make the difference between a reader who finishes the month and one who doesn’t.
Helping at home
Keep the momentum
Make it the same time every day
Twenty minutes after dinner beats an hour on Sunday. Consistency is what builds fluency, and it’s what makes the monthly goal feel easy instead of impossible.
Let them pick the book
Comics, joke books, cereal boxes, the same dinosaur book for the fourth time — all of it counts. Choice is the single biggest predictor of whether a kid keeps reading.
Read to them, too
For the youngest grades, being read to counts toward most classroom goals. Ask your child’s teacher how they’re counting it.
Put the tracker somewhere visible
Your child’s classroom has a progress poster on the wall. A version of the same thing on your fridge works surprisingly well.
Celebrate the certificate
Make the SONIC trip its own event rather than folding it into errands. The point is that they earned it.
Ask the teacher for the goal
Each classroom sets its own target. Knowing whether it’s minutes, pages or books makes it much easier to support at home.
Not in the program yet?
Wacky Reader is already running in 129 schools and more than 2,300 classrooms — and it’s free for any elementary school to join. If your child’s school isn’t participating, the fastest path is a teacher or principal reaching out.
Ask your child’s teacher
