Numerous studies have shown that reading over the summer prevents “summer reading loss.” By the end of 6^th grade, children who lose reading skills over the summer are two years behind their classmates.

Reading four or five books over the summer can have a significant impact for middle school readers. Summer Reading programs usually encourage readers, especially those who are struggling, to use alternate formats such as magazines, recorded books, graphic novels, and material on the internet.

As for adults, Summer Reading encourages them to find time to relax during the hectic summer months by reading or incorporating reading (listening to audiobooks) during tasks. This can help relieve stress, or make boring or daunting tasks more enjoyable.

Summer Reading activities in libraries provide quality learning activities that are fun, and encourage some of the best techniques identified by research as being important to the reading process, even virtually!

We’re offering a virtual Summer Reading program this summer through BeanStack, and participants can register for challenges based on their ages all summer. Remember, you get prizes based on how many days you read. For instance, if you sign up on July 15^th, you will only have time to receive the prize for reading 10 days.

For each challenge you complete, you will receive a badge and the more badges you get, the closer you get to winning prizes! You will also receive tickets for certain challenges you complete, which can be entered into different drawings for gift cards to local businesses in Saline County.

For completing 10 days, you will receive a book bag to help kickstart Saline County Library’s plastic bag-free campaign. For reading 25 days, you will receive a Summer Reading 2020 t-shirt and for reading 40 days, you have the choice of receiving a Saline County Library water bottle or book bucks for the Friends of the Library Used Bookstore.

We’re also hosting weekly programs for each age group with a mixture of Facebook live and recorded video programs, and private Zoom calls to allow children and their families to interact with our librarians.

You can view our calendar of events here. For full schedules with descriptions, as well as links to register, click here, which also includes instructions and a link to sign up for the Summer Reading Challenges on BeanStack.