Children First: Summer book club keeps kids reading - KOTA Territory News

Children First: Summer book club keeps kids reading

Usually, summer vacation means teenagers put down the books and kick back.

But a KOTA Territory high school is encouraging kids to read while they're out of the classroom.

"My reading level's been pretty low for the last long while," said Shaylyn Smith, a soon-to-be-senior at Sheridan High School.

Smith doesn't consider herself much of a reader, but she's doing what she can to change that.

"I was hoping that doing the book club would help my reading raise up," she said.

Smith was one of just four students who showed up for the first meeting of Sheridan's summer reading group.

"I think students will be in and out," said Fulmer Public Library librarian Debbie Iverson, one of the two book club leaders. She's confident that the first meeting doesn't dictate how many kids will show up throughout the summer.

"I know of one young woman who has already been in to collect her book because she's off to Washington, D.C., for a school trip," Iverson said. 

"So she's excited to participate, but just couldn't be there today."

Iverson added they had hoped to attract more students by catering the group to the teenagers.

"We try to make it appealing and choose books that are of interest to them," she said.

The book club meets at Sheridan's Fulmer Public Library every two weeks until the beginning of August to discuss one book and to pick up the next.

"We have three titles chosen this summer," Iverson said. "They're all works of fiction."

"We usually remember [the importance of] younger children and elementary students ... practicing and reading during the summer," said Sheridan High School librarian LaDonna Leibrich, the other group leader, "and it's the same way with young adults."

"If you practice a skill on an ongoing basis," added Iverson, "you keep that skill. If you get away from it for the summer and don't use that skill, then you've lost a little ground, particularly at the student level."

Smith's really looking forward to more practice over the summer months.

She's set some summer goals for herself.

"It'll help me read faster, and I'll be able to actually concentrate on the book more, you know," she said, "and not be so out there."

This is the third summer Sheridan High School has helped put on a book club.

And even though it's an extension of Title Waves, a reading group that meets during the school year, the members are usually different.