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DEL.ICIO.USHow do you keep kids reading in summer?
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
“Happy summer! Stay safe and READ!!!” the school sign said.
I wondered how many would do that.
Not stay safe.
How many will read?
Summer reading programs have around as long as I remember. I recall walking to my elementary school library, a quiet and cool oasis, the two window air-conditioning units humming. We’d spend an hour picking out and stacking up our selections.
At home, we’d methodically work through them, logging them on the small, folded, paper sheets that would earn us recognition, if nothing else, when school resumed.
Today there are so many other attractions - and distractions - for kids. How many spend time lying around with books?
According to Denise Auger, community partnership coordinator for the Gwinnett County Public Library, 20,842 children - including teens - signed up for Gwinnett’s summer reading program in 2007.
The program has grown each year — some of that paralleling Gwinnett County’s population growth and the expansion of the library system. The number of library cards issued by Gwinnett is up 60 percent since 2000.
Gwinnett’s system has worked to accommodate and attract summer users, Auger said.
Among its efforts, the library allows online sign up for the summer reading program. Visit Gwinnett Public Library site. It offers separate programs for the preschool ages grade school ages, but offers them simultaneously to help out mothers who may have children in both ranges. Storytellers, puppet shows and a magician are among this year’s scheduled attractions at branches.
Because day care centers - due to liability issues and car seat rules - have cut back on outings to the libraries, the library is sending outreach staff to the day care centers. This year, libraries have added evening programs to better accommodate working parents and working teens.
Sessions directly targeting teens - including one where you learn to apply theatrical makeup — have been added, Auger said. It’s a fun activity that draws teens in and then can be connected back to literature, she said.
The library system also has garnered $285,000 in prizes and sponsorships from local businesses, some given to kids when they sign up and others reserved for those who complete the program and turn their reading logs back into the library. The prizes range from Chick-fil-A and Cici’s Pizza certificates to free passes to local museums and arts centers.
While it’s true there are other interests for kids nowadays, Auger said, and the library has to work “a little harder,” she doesn’t really see those other interests as competition. There is nothing like the summer reading program — it is right in the community, and it is all “absolutely free,” she said.
When my kids were young, we would sign up each summer. We’d start off strong. After a few weeks, however, summer trips, vacation Bible school and other activities would interrupt the effort. Sometimes we would get back on track and turn in the completed logs. Sometimes not.
About 16 percent of the kids who signed up last year turned in their reading lists at the end of the summer, Auger said.
“That doesn’t mean others didn’t complete the program,” she said. Mothers often find it difficult to get back and turn in the paperwork, she said.
This year, they are hoping the prizes will motivate more to do so.
Reading in the summer is more than just an inexpensive pastime. Multiple studies support the importance of reading to student performance. Check out a few
In one, researcher Barbara Heyns followed sixth- and seventh-graders in the Atlanta public schools through two school years and the intervening summer.
Among her findings:
• The number of books read during the summer is consistently related to academic gains.
• Children in every income group who read six or more books over the summer gained more in reading achievement than children who did not.
Do (or did) your children participate in summer reading programs? What’s been your experience? How do you encourage summer reading?
Permalink | Comments (9) | Post your comment | Categories: Susan Gast
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By Raising Readers
June 4, 2008 9:41 AM | Link to this
WE haven’t participated in any summer programs other than the lists the schools send out for summer reading. In our home we only have 1 TV and that’s in the living room. My husband and I read daily for pleasure, and that habit has rubbed off on the kids. We read the same books and then have in depth conversations about them. Sometimes this means each of us reading out of our preferred genre, but it’s good to do that! We’ve read, as a family, the Series of Unfortunate Events, Harry Potter, Pendragon, the Original Land of Oz books, the Narnia series, Orson Scott Card, Piers Anthony, Terry Pratchett, the list goes on and on. Bottom line is your kids won’t be tricked into reading with cheap prizes. If they grow up in a reading home, they will read.
What was the last thing they saw you read?
By Theresa
June 4, 2008 10:00 AM | Link to this
Hey Susan — The MOMania blog is getting together a list of recommended reading from the Gwinnett County library to help parents pick out books for their kids. Our 1st grade teacher last year sent home a list of 30 books to work on during the summer and we loved having a little direction as to what were good, age-appropriate books. We hope the Gwinnett County Library list will also give parents a little direction. WE should be posting it in the next week — as soon as I can get it edited. At home, we’ve got to get busy on Rose’s summer reading — she too registered for the program.
By Ken
June 4, 2008 10:45 AM | Link to this
Hey Raising Readers, it is great that your family reads so much. I commend you for being active readers and discussing the books with your children. BUT I also think it is great that the library offers a program to encourage reading. There are so many families out there that don’t read it is scary. The library program is very low key and the prizes are minimal. They allow you to set your own goal, discussing it with a parent of course, that way a reluctant reader who manages to get through one book is acknowledged, just as the avid reader who reads 100 books that summer. The library also allows you to choose the books you want to read, and if you are reading off of a list for school, guess what, those books count.
By Steve
June 4, 2008 6:51 PM | Link to this
Actually, I don’t want my kids sitting at home reading. I want them out playing and experiencing life. Plenty of time for more reading when school starts up again.
By Katie
June 5, 2008 8:01 AM | Link to this
My parents would not allow my brother and I to watch more than 1 hour of TV a day. We were encouraged to read on a daily basis. Of course, both my parents were English Professors. Reading is a lot more entertaining than watching TV but learning that is a process. Parents have to take charge of their parenting skills and instill that mentality at an early age. Once a kid is lazy, they’re lazy for life. We also played multipal sports and were busy with that.
By Laura
June 5, 2008 2:18 PM | Link to this
When I was a kid, which was only about ten years ago, I LOVED READING. Once a week we would go to the library and I would stock up on Nancy Drew, Goosebumps and the Boxcar Children. I participated in the summer reading program but all I got at the end was a sheet of paper saying I did it.
I had a life, too. I was on swim team, I watched T.V, I played wiffle ball, I played nintendo, I rode my bike…you can balance it out in the summer.
Really this had no point to make, I was just enjoying typing out the nostalgia.
By jm
June 8, 2008 6:26 PM | Link to this
I, too, grew up in a family who read. And I would ride my bike all summer and be down at the neighborhood pool the minute it opened to the minute it closed. And then come home, woof down dinner in about 3 minutes, go outside to play ghost in the graveyard (Basically hide in go seek in the dark) until I had to be in at 10:00. I love to read. I still to this day go to the library and check out books. 3 out of my 4 kids love to read. As soon as I say “I’m going to the library, does anybody…” the 3 are in the car. I love the smell of the books. The thrill of seeing that book that I have been wanting to read. Yes, I could go buy it at the bookstore but the way that I go through books around this house is how my car goes through gas these days. When my kids were younger, they participated in the summer reading program. But they are bigger now and think that they know everything (or so they seem to think it) and as long as they still enjoy the reading on their own time; then I’m ok w/them not doing the summer program. But I do think that it is a good program. Oh, and I also did the summer reading program when I was a kid growing up in DeKalb county.
By Gandalf, the Grey
June 11, 2008 12:23 PM | Link to this
Read or get grounded, simply as that.
By Tom
June 22, 2008 10:51 AM | Link to this
The question is: How do you keep readers when you don’t have a new entry for 2 weeks?