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Reading and Arts Festivals
Looking to add a bit of culture to the family? Reading and arts festivals can be the perfect opportunity…
Flickr photo by The Flying Enchilada
A Reading and Arts Festival can be a fun activity for your child’s PTA or PTO to sponsor to create excitement about reading. Here are a few ideas to make yours a success.
Sponsor a book exchange: Children bring a gently used book and get a new book. Donate used books to charity.
Invite guest readers: College football players, people with interesting jobs, local celebrities or TV news anchors can read books that relate to their area of specialty. At our school festival readers included a Miss Nebraska contestant, a well-known Husker football player, high school baseball players completing a public service requirement, a professional pilot and a visually impaired high school student who demonstrated reading in Braille. Be creative. The options are endless.
Have a door decorating contest: Combine art and reading and have classes compete to create a classroom door celebrating their favorite book. Guests vote on the doors and the class that wins gets a special prize like extra recess or a class party.
Flickr photo by smcgee
Display classroom art: Make your school an art museum by placing works around the building for visitors to enjoy.
Make a bookmark: Remember the evening every time your read by creating a bookmark that celebrates art and reading.
For more ideas, check out your local public library: Often public libraries host well-known authors, art displays and artists and activities to promote reading and art. Best of all, these are often free or inexpensive. And they might inspire more ideas of ways to connect reading and art in your child’s school.
What a great idea! Maybe readers can submit names and venues of local festivals? We have the Duarte Festival of Authors coming up October 8 in Duarte, CA; I’ll be on a children’s/YA authors’ panel. Any other festivals coming up?
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Howard County Central Library in Columbia, Maryland will be holding Bookapalooza on Saturday, June 16, 2012. It’s our inaugural children’s book festival featuring Katherine Paterson, Jerdine Nolen, MIchael Buckley, Jacqueline Jules, Pamela Duncan Edwards, Rachel Renee Russell, Mary Downing Hahn, Marc Tyler Nobleman and Tom Angleberger!!! It will be an amazing day of authors on stage, signing books, crafts, face painting, Howard County Astronomical League is bringing telescopes for solar viewings….. In other others something for everyone and tremendous event connecting children to great books!
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