New Year’s Book Resolutions
<img class=”alignnone size-full wp-image-1239″ title=”Encouraging kids to make reading resolutions for 2014 | Hafuboti.com” src=”http://hafuboti.wpcomstaging.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/12/nby-header.jpg” alt=”It’s party time at the library – where I try and encourage some life-long reading habits using bright colors.” width=”437″ height=”273″>
A relatively popular program that is entering its third year at our library is a “New Year’s at Noon” storytime. It’s been dubbed <em>New Year’s New Books</em> and this year I’m in charge of putting it together. I’ve never attended any of the past ones, so I’m just winging it in terms of what will be going on. I have a handful of new books ranging from picture books to junior books set aside fresh from being processed. I’ll discuss those new books and will have them set out and ready to be checked-out after the storytime. I’ll read two New Year’s related stories, and then give the children cheap noisemakers to keep (in order to ring in the “noon year”).
It’s pretty basic and should hopefully be fun. After all, kids love being given the approval to get wildly loud in the library.
After reading <a href=”http://www.abbythelibrarian.com/2013/11/reading-in-wild-ideas-for-your-library.html” target=”_blank” rel=”noopener noreferrer”>this post</a> from <a href=”http://www.abbythelibrarian.com/” target=”_blank” rel=”noopener noreferrer”>Abby the Librarian</a>, I’ve been looking for any way to encourage lifelong reading habits. And the <em>having a reading plan </em>seemed like a natural fit with this program.
One of the two stories I’ll be reading is <em>Squirrel’s New Year’s Resolution </em>by Pat Miller. After reading it, I want to hand out my resolution form that has prompts to get the kids to at least think about reading more this year. And on the back side I made a space for the kids or parents to write down any of the books that I chat about for their future reference if they don’t get to check out all of the ones they are interested in that day.
Naturally, I want to share with you my <em>New Year’s Book Resolution</em> sheet. As always, please feel free to use, modify, and have fun with this:
<a href=”http://hafuboti.wpcomstaging.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/12/resolutions1.pdf” target=”_blank” rel=”noopener noreferrer”><img class=”alignnone size-medium wp-image-1236″ title=”Click here to get a downloadable pdf of this and its back side (pictured to the right).” src=”http://hafuboti.wpcomstaging.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/12/nby-front2.jpg?w=232″ alt=”A set of fill-in-the-blank resolutions to encourage kids to make reading an important part of the new year.” width=”232″ height=”300″><img class=”alignnone wp-image-1237″ title=”Yes, I like bright rainbow colors. Why do you ask?” src=”http://hafuboti.wpcomstaging.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/12/nby-back2.jpg?w=231″ alt=”The other side of the New Year’s Book Resolutions sheet where kids can list books that they’d like to read this year.” width=”231″ height=”300″></a>
This is the last storytime that I’ll be the creator/runner of at the library. It’s been a challenging few months, but it’s been a blast. I’ll happily step in and help out in any way I can if Jennifer ever wants or needs me to, but it really solidified for me the fact that I’m in the perfect position at my library. I really look forward to coordinating/marketing events and seeing what exciting things my team can do in the next year.
