Book Fun

Palmer library encourages readers

JOEL DAVIDSON

Frontiersman reporter

PALMER - While national reports indicate that American children read less as the years go by, the Palmer Public Library is working hard to fight that trend.

Hundreds of children flocked to the library Friday afternoon to celebrate the conclusion of the summer reading program, which included 618 kids this year, better than 100 more from last summer.

Candace Kopperud helped put together this year's events. As the library's services coordinator, Kopperud believes active summer reading programs are vital to a child's development.

"Reading continues all the skills they learned during the school year," she said Friday. "A lot of times if you have three months without practicing and building off what you learned, kids go back to school [and] they have really lost months of their education."

Honing academic skill isn't the only reason for kids to read, though.

"It's just a fun activity," Kopperud said. "It's totally free and it helps develop your mind."

The library encouraged kids to read at least four hours a week. As an incentive, the young readers received weekly stamps and prizes for their efforts.

Parents were also encouraged to read at least 10 books a week to younger children who hadn't yet learned to read.

Mat-Su resident Susan Pougher read a number of books about spiders to her 5-year-old son, Nate. By the end of the reading program, Nate could recite exact scientific facts about spiders (or arachnids, as he called them).

"Not all arachnids spin webs," Nate stated matter-of-factly when asked what he had learned this summer.

His older brother, Ian, is heading for the fourth grade this fall, and he should be plenty prepared.

Ian doesn't remember how many books he's read so far this summer but he has no plans to quit just because the reading program ended Friday.

His favorite reading this summer was the fifth Harry Potter book, which he claims is more fun than watching TV. Soon Ian plans to crack open the classic H.G. Wells book, "War of the Worlds."

"It's quite a bit of reading, but it keeps him away from the TV a little bit," his mom said.

Kopperud said reading programs face plenty of competition from a growing list of activities that distract kids from books.

"As the world develops, more things come at kids as alternatives, you know, and sometimes it's just easier to give a kids a game or have them watch TV. But if parents will just spend a few years, especially those formative years, encouraging kids to read, it makes a big difference."

The seven-week reading program focused on ages that ranged from birth to 18 years. Kopperud said it's never too early to begin reading to kids.

Along with teaching kids how to sit appropriately while parents read, Kopperud said stories also develop verbal, listening and visual focusing skills.

"I believe it makes a big difference to start reading to a child when they are six months," she explained.

"Children between the ages of birth and four years, those are formative years and if you wait until they are in school, then you've really lost a lot of opportunity."

Contact Joel Davidson at 352-2266, or joel.davidson@frontiersman.com.