Using Bracelets to Reward Reading

Sleeping in, visiting the beach and reading at your leisure rather than studying textbooks are among the pleasures of summer, which arrives in 27 days.

But young readers don’t have to wait that long to join the Washington County Free Library’s free summer reading clubs, which have a road-trip theme this year.

Registration begins Friday, June 1, and the program runs through Friday, Aug. 31, said Jeff Ridgeway, head of the Children’s Services for the county library system. Youths can pick up a game board, small book bag and pencil at the Central Library’s Children’s Department in downtown Hagerstown, on the bookmobile, or at any of the library branches in the county.

There are three different game boards for three age groups, Ridgeway said. The age groups are birth through age 3; children of preschool and elementary school age; and middle- and high-school ages.

Each game board requires youths to read library books (or parents to read books aloud), plus there are activities to do such as having toddlers talk to a librarian and act out a story they’ve read. Activities for elementary-age youths include reading outside and reading with a friend or pet. Middle- and high-schoolers are asked to write a local legend or true, weird tale from their community, read and make a recipe, and use the Internet for some tasks.

Youths who finish “trips” on the game boards receive prizes. Prizes, depending on each youth’s age group, include a small inflatable beach ball, a balloon car or a rubber bracelet, Ridgeway said. Middle- and high-schoolers who finish can enter their names for nine chances to win one of several gift certificates to local businesses.

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