New Year, New Reading Projects

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  I’ve been thinking about the all the upcoming opportunities to share books with kids this year.  I’m excited about the opportunity to partner with teachers to provide a variety of positive reading experiences with students.

We all know that kids are social, so one of my goals is to make reading more social too.  Certainly books can be enjoyed independently, as a private and silent conversation between the reader and the author.  But books can also be read aloud and discussed and debated and reviewed and recommended in a way that builds a shared excitement for reading.

One of the ways I can foster these types of interactions is by collaborating with teachers on some social reading events.  So far I have the following on my list:

  •  International Dot Day (Sept 15-ish) – a celebration of creativity, inspired by the book The Dot by Peter Reynolds.
  •  National Comic Book Day (Sept 25) – an event that I like to celebrate with a Comic Book Read-In in the library featuring an assortment of graphic novels for students to enjoy.
  •   The Global Read Aloud (Oct 1 – Nov 9) – founded by Pernille Ripp to connect and unite students around the world through a common reading experience, and dependent on teachers following a universal read aloud schedule. There are different books selected for different grade levels. (Pictured: Amal Unbound by Aisha Saeed)
  •   Jumpstart’s Read for the Record (Oct 25) – an initiative developed to highlight the importance of early literacy, which this year features the book Maybe Something Beautiful by F. Isabel Campoy and Theresa Howell.
  •   Picture Book Month (the entire month of November) – an international literacy initiative that celebrates the print picture book and provides a themed literacy calendar and blog posts from picture book authors and illustrators sharing their thoughts on why picture books are important.
  •   The South Carolina Children’s Book Award program (going on now) – a children’s choice award sponsored each year by the S.C. Association of School Librarians. Students read books from a list of 20 nominated titles from one of four age-based categories, and then vote on their favorite.  The format makes it the perfect foundation for a student (or teacher!) book club.  (If you don’t live in South Carolina, your state probably offers a similar program.)

What reading events are you looking forward to this year?  Please leave a comment or tweet me @LibraryLoriJune and share!

 

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