Get a Clue: reading is a cool summer activity.
At least according to area libraries and enthusiastic reading club members and parents.
The Traverse Area District Library's main facility, branches and member libraries are all hosting reading clubs this summer coordinated around a state-wide theme of Get a Clue at Your Library. Enrolling hundreds of young, tween and teen readers among them, the libraries off a range of programs, activities and prizes that keep kids coming in even when school is out.
"I read a lot, I read a lot last year,” said Jack Conlon, 9, who joined the Peninsula Community Library's summer reading club for the second year. "I like that you can win prizes.”
From oral reports to tracking minutes to counting pages read, each library takes a slightly different approach to nurturing a love of books. The main library on Woodmere, which has been holding a reading program for decades dating back to the old Carnegie library on Sixth street, has an eight-week program where kids may give an oral report on up to two books a week. Librarians or volunteers who listen to the reports give nominal prizes, worksheets, stickers and bookmarks as a token reward.
"We really like it a lot because it gives the readers an opportunity to talk about what they're reading and learn to summarize,” said Bernadette Groppuso, youth services coordinator at the main library. "Some are talkative from day one but need to learn to capsulize a little bit and others are just learning to talk to people other than their parents and siblings so it's neat they can do this in a caring, supportive environment.”
Kingsley Public Library and the Fife Lake Public Library both track achievement by measuring minutes, not books, read. Offering separate activities for young readers and tweens/teens, the Kingsley summer reading club has young readers log their daily reading minutes; older members work toward a weekly page goal, with a minimum of 100 pages.
"Everybody reads at a different speed,” noted Julie Gray, director of the Fife Lake Public Library. "If you're a slow reader, you still spend an hour.”
The proposed Blair Township Library jumps into the reading club fray this year by launching a Summer Library at the Playground featuring programs for all ages on Thursdays from July 19 through August 23. The events will be held at the Blair Township Picnic Pavilion and are sponsored by the Blair Library Committee.
Library consultant and volunteer Mandy Gibson, who troubleshoots, advocates for and advises libraries around the region, noted that the demographics in Blair Township make it ripe for a branch library. The young and growing community has 7,500 people, most living within three miles of the proposed library site near the township hall and park.
The summer program is a way to show the community what a library could do and the Traverse Area District Library that there is sufficient interest and energy in the community. If approved, funded and built, the library would be a future branch of the Traverse Area District Library.
"What we're thinking is we have this wonderful playground and a wonderful school a mile down the road, now we're really making a community out here,” said Gibson, a resident of Fife Lake.