Lots of serious teaching and testing can, on occasion, silence the silly and stifle small spirits at Bronx Little School. “Reading is so much fun and sometimes fun gets lost in the building,” said math coach Kathelyn Ovalles. Dr. Seuss to the rescue! No one was more serious about silly than Dr. Seuss. Hats were off to the late author of more than 140 whimsical, subversive and clever books, whose birthday on March 2 was celebrated at the Bronx school and throughout the country as part of the National Education Association’s Read Across America day. A team of Bronx Little School teachers dreamed up all sorts of ways to mark the occasion, from creating a Dr. Seuss photo booth to inviting parents to come and listen to their children read “The Cat in the Hat,” “Hop on Pop” and other classics. The author would have been tickled green that laughing was the coin of the realm at school all day. “Dr. Seuss books teach them to love to read,” said Melissa Noble, a 2nd-grade teacher and an organizer of the event. “They rhyme, they’re fun and the little ones laugh while they’re reading.” She noted that poverty has limited many of the students’ horizons. “The books show them there is a great big world out there, and it is not beyond their reach,” she said. “It belongs to them, too.” Every prekindergartner to 5th-grader walked away with a most precious gift: a Dr. Seuss book to keep. “Nothing beat the smiles and excitement on their faces,” said Ovalles. “Priceless.”