Summer Reading starts June 22!

Summer time means fun in the sun, playing outdoors, and, we hope, time to read under your favourite tree. To encourage kids of all ages to read during the summer, the library hosts a Summer Reading Club each year.  In order to reduce the “Summer Slide” that many students experience, we provide fun programs and incentives to keep kids reading and learning all summer long. 

This year, the club begins on June 22, and runs through August 22.  We are excited to build programs and activities around this year’s theme, PLAY! Anyone 18 and under is invited to join our club, and read the summer away.  Lots of your favourite activities are making a comeback this year. 

We are very pleased to partner once again with Upper Clements Parks to offer a free Fast Pass to everyone who completes the Summer Reading Club. When kids sign up, they will receive a booklet for tracking their READ and PLAY time. We have many fun activities on our booklet this year that families can enjoy together! Teens will read for 25 hours to earn their Fast Pass, and can enter for great gift card prizes for every 5 hours they read.  

We’ll also be returning to the zoo! Oaklawn Farm Zoo has generously agreed to host two Library Days at the Zoo. On Tuesday, July 21 and on Tuesday, August 11, if you are 18 or under you get in FREE to the zoo just by showing your AVRL library card.  Our Bookmobile will be onsite and we’ll have lots of fun activities for kids those days, too. 

We’ve got a few special programs lined up, including Little Ray’s Reptiles, a Musical Zoo, and a Marionette Show from Montreal’s Panadream Theatre.  We’ll have our Book Give Away Days, made possible in part by Adopt a Library. Chirpy, our little owl friend, is ready to travel. Send us a picture of Chirpy and you could win some great prizes! Our travelling Maker Labs have been refreshed, and we’ve got some fun robotics toys to play with, too. The C@P youth are back and they’ll host a wide variety of technology programs. Our branches are planning plenty of fun programs and activities so check our Calendar of Events to see what’s going on at your local library.

Wrapping up the STREAM

Summer is drawing to a close. Already, I’ve seen a few red leaves on the trees. Here at the library, we’ve had a very busy summer with our STREAM Reading program. This year, 2761 kids and teens participated – that’s up from 2667 last year. And for those who love numbers, just a little aside—in 2009 (only 5 years ago), we had 2252 signed up. That’s a 22% increase! So, yes, if you walked into your local library this summer and found it busy, there’s a reason why. We had over 700 kids and teens participating in our Kentville branch alone! You might have seen little fishes taped to walls, or stones outside in a pathway: these all represented the readers in our libraries. 

 

We changed our program this summer to incorporate more learning activities, and it has been met with positive feedback from many of you.  We offered programs to play math games, did science experiments, created collages and glitter pictures, made crafts with old t-shirts, danced with our preschoolers, saw some reptiles, watched chemical reactions, raced toothbrush robots, created movies with LEGO, read lots of stories, and listened to great music. Many of our programs this summer were made possible because we received the CFUW Library Award! This award allowed us to offer great programs all over the valley.

Our partners made the Summer STREAM even better. Upper Clements Parks has been a long-time partner for our summer program, offering a FREE Fast Pass for those who complete the program. Many of our families take advantage of this and visit the park each year. This partnership has been invaluable to the program and we are truly thankful to Upper Clements Parks for this great opportunity. Part of our partnership includes Word in the Park, two days near the end of the program when we have activities at the park. This year we had a StoryWalk challenge and gave away free books, and Clifford the big Red Dog came for a visit.  This year we also added two Library Days at the Zoo in partnership with Oaklawn Farm Zoo. Once in July and once in August, everyone 18 and under got in free by showing their library card. We also did activities during the day and took our bookmobile out to the zoo. Thank you, thank you, thank you to our partners! 

Another activity that we loved was Finny the Fish. We asked you to print, color, and photograph our little fish. Finny went all over the world this summer! You can see Finny’s travels here.  As a bonus, everyone that sent a picture was entered to win a One-year Family Pass to Nova Scotia Museums. 

We had lots of fun this summer, and we hope you did too. We’ll do it all again next year, and we look forward to playing and learning with you in Summer 2015. We'd love to hear your thoughts on the program, so tell us in the comments below!

--Angela J. Reynolds, Head of Youth Services

Library Days at Oaklawn Farm Zoo

 

Get in touch with your wild side at Oaklawn Farm Zoo.   Located just outside Aylesford in the beautiful Annapolis Valley,  Oaklawn Farm provides a visitors an up-close view with over a 100  species of animals.  Summer is always a busy time at the Zoo.  Many new babies have been born, including goats, llamas, monkeys, sheep, and the list goes on.  Most recent additions at the zoo include a group of Lion-tailed Macaques that arrived in May and three Cheetahs that arrived in June.  The young lion pride of Sterk , Nyah and Obi are a huge favourite to many visitors, as well as the gibbon family of BooBoo, Zandor and their little ones. Come out and discover your favourite creature today!

 

This summer, the library has partnered with Oaklawn Farm Zoo to offer a great opportunity-- everyone 18 and under who shows their AVRL library card on July 15 and August 12 gets in FREE!  So make sure you have your card in hand, and join us. In addition to the amazing animals, we will be doing storytimes, art, and math games. You can also take a StoryWalk while you are at the zoo! Come find us on July 15 or August 12 from 10 AM - 4 PM, by the deer pen. You can also mark off some activities on your STREAM card. See you at the zoo!

Spring Babies

Are you anxious for spring to begin this year?  Spring officially began on March 20. There are signs that it is on its way:  bulbs peeking through the earth, insects migrating across the snow, geese returning, and spring babies are being born. 

Our Middleton branch is offering a ‘Welcome Spring’ program on Tuesday, March 25 from 6:30 – 8:30 pm.  Come and learn how to make a colourful flower arrangement, plant some seeds to take home and see baby lambs and bunnies. There will also be delicious snacks to enjoy. Bring the family to welcome spring and say goodbye to winter!

A very special baby is growing up at the Oaklawn Farm Zoo. He is an African Lion and his name is Obi. Our Youth Services Librarian, Angela Reynolds, and I were fortunate to meet him this week. When entering the kitchen, Gail said “And here comes the lion, you’ll need to put your boots on top of the fridge!”  The Oaklawn Farm Zoo is an incredible destination for families to visit. At this time of year, a belted Galloway calf, a horned Dorset lamb and many other species are welcoming new babies. This year Oaklawn Farm Zoo is opening on April 12.  Check out their website for more information.  Stay tuned for a surprise partnership with the zoo this summer!  You will be as happy as we are to see what we have planned.

Young families can share baby animal storytime with some of these Baby Animal books.

For many more selections for all ages, browse our online catalogue. Reading about baby animals is a wonderful way to get excited about spring.

Wendy Kearnes, Outreach Services Manager

Special thanks to Oaklawn Farm Zoo for allowing us to use pictures from their Facebook page.