In 2012, the Youth Services team at Skokie Public Library decided to create a summer reading initiative for middle school youth. We all know that pleasure reading takes a nosedive when kids hit middle school — something about all those junior high reading assignments — and we wanted to see if we could help to change that.
Hooray for PreK! is an interactive weekly storytime that incorporates the five early literacy practices (talk, sing, read, write and play) as well as science and math concepts. Four- and five-year-old children attend this registered program with an adult caregiver.
Libraries know all about the “summer slide.” We’ve addressed summer learning loss with reading clubs and other educational programs for decades. As a matter of fact, some families have come to view libraries as a sort of summer school or educational camp during the longest, hottest days of the year. Whoever thinks summers are slow at a library has never visited a youth department in June, July or August!
Here at Skokie Public Library, we aim to offer a variety of learning experiences in every program cycle. That means we’ll have storytimes, performances, clubs and hands-on creation programs during every calendar period. When we want to allow kids to really dive into a topic, however, we try to think beyond our usual one-off programs. When we want kids to really explore, develop skills and make something, we offer multi-day boot camps.
At Skokie Public Library, we recently spent four months exploring different aspects of what it means to be human, as a host site of ALA's Exploring Human Origins exhibition. In one of our upper-elementary science programs, we focused specifically on the human brain and its memory capabilities. The program was literally sugar-coated, as you’ll see below.
Once a week in summer months, we have a program for kids in the small courtyard just outside of our youth department. The program, called Nature Play, is extremely popular with young children between the ages of 2 and 5 and their caregivers. It’s all about letting kids get outside with supplies and providing activities for exploring natural elements (like sand, water and dirt) — and, of course, getting a bit dirty in the process.
Friend Squad is a welcoming, inclusive social group for students aged 11 to 16 years old. While many of our participants, or friends, have special needs, the program is open to anyone who struggles with establishing and maintaining friendship connections.
This summer the Skokie Public Library offered a drop-in program entitled Meet at the Lodge every weekday for youth entering grades 3 through 5. Meet at the Lodge was timed to be in conjunction with the free summer lunch program we offer through the federally funded summer lunch program; our goal was to offer a convenient and free opportunity for kids to have a mini-camp experience from 12 to 2:30 p.m. every day (lunch lasted 60 minutes, Meet at the Lodge lasted 90).
Over the past few years at Skokie Public Library, we’ve revamped our programming for the under-2 set. We think we’ve come up with a great way to serve young families. We call it Baby Wednesdays, and here’s how it works.
