Mobile Public Library is celebrating summer all season long with their Summer Library Celebration. Beginning June 3rd, the library invites children and families to participate in a variety of activities, including special guest performances, crafts, games and a reading challenge for all ages. The celebration lasts throughout all June and July.
Registration for the celebration is open now. All registrants will receive a Summer Activity Booklet detailing the performers, events and programs set to take place.
The Summer Library Celebration hosts a yearly reading challenge open to all ages. This year, the challenge is for participants to read for 400 minutes. Once 400 minutes of reading is completed, patrons will be entered into a grand prize drawing to win camping equipment bundles or family movie packs. Three movie packs and camping equipment bundles will be given away at each Mobile Public Library location, one for children, one for teens and one for adults. Patrons can bring their completed reading log to the library or get a badge through the Beanstack app to be entered to win.
Cherold Rhodes is the Youth Services Manager for Mobile Public Libraries. She said the weekly programs and reading challenge serve a greater purpose for the community of Mobile.
“We hope to inspire kids to practice and develop a love of reading that will carry over into the school year, and they will continue to read more because everyone who reads tends to do better,” Rhodes said.
Rhodes said the challenge and the Summer Library Celebration help to prevent the “summer slide,” which is when a summer learning loss can occur due to children not engaging in educational activities during the months they are away from the classroom, according to the U.S. Department of Education.
“When children get out of school, they're not learning in school, practicing lessons, reading for schools, and they stop reading, then they can slide back,” Rhodes said. “And so, if they read during the summer, and they reach these reading goals, and they're coming in, they're having fun, and they're still learning, then we don't have as much summer slide.”
Preventing the summer slide is just one benefit, Rhodes said, of the Summer Library Celebration. In addition, participants in the program are learning about new experiences and cultures they might not have been exposed to otherwise.
The celebration kicks off on June 1st, with a block party in front of the Ben May main library location in Mobile.
“We have vendors from across the city, partners who are working with us and bringing their activities and information about their organization. So you can come and talk to them and do activities with them. And then we'll have yard games and sidewalk chalks and DJ and we'll be giving away books and cupcakes with our with our cupcake book walk and just a whole lot of fun,” Rhodes said.
To register for the Summer Library Celebration, or learn more about the summer reading challenge, click here.
