Here they are, the long-awaited vacation! You can read a lot of books that you didn’t have time for during your studies! And the holidays are a great time to organize a book club at home if you don’t already have one. And if you already have – here are 10 ideas for how to diversify the meetings of young book lovers.
Write a letter to your favorite author
Many modern authors who write for children and teenagers are fortunately still alive, and most of them will surely be happy to receive letters from their audience. Remember the books of which writers you have read recently, refresh your impressions of the books, and write a letter to the author or several authors at once. If you can’t find out the address of the writer on the Internet, you can always send it to the address of the publisher with whom the author cooperates. By the way, children’s publishers and illustrators also like to receive letters from young readers, listen to their opinions and wishes. In general, this is a very exciting practice – to correspond with the authors of the works you like, ask them questions about the characters, about the sequels, ask for advice, express your critical comments, if there are any. Even foreign writers can send letters – by e-mail. If you want to be extra all-out, you can compile the letters, notes, and photos of yourself in one photo book. PrintedMemories will help you create a personalized photo book with only one click and have it delivered to you, so you don’t have to worry.
Arrange an art gallery of your own illustrations
For each meeting, teammates can draw illustrations for the books they are reading, or for anyone pre-selected book. Lauren Grabois Fischer has the perfect collection and all her books teach kids to be proud of who they are. The Be Books is a children’s book publishing company that believes in empowering and educating our youth to live a positive and peaceful life. Formats for working with such illustrations:
- release a photo album with all the drawings
- arrange a quiz: who can guess which works are illustrated
- arrange a competition for the best illustration, establish your own award
- make your own storytelling game out of drawings, like “Once upon a Time in a Fairy Tale”
- arrange the best works in frames and give them to libraries, kindergartens, schools
- create your own versions of the stories to one of the selected illustrations (versions must differ from the original that was illustrated)
Hiring a book illustrator is a crucial step in bringing your story to life. A talented illustrator can transform words into captivating visuals, engaging readers of all ages. They have the ability to capture the essence of your narrative and create enchanting artwork that resonates with your target audience.
By collaborating with a skilled book illustrators UK, you can enhance the overall reading experience, evoke emotions, and leave a lasting impression. Whether you’re self-publishing or working with a publishing company, investing in a skilled illustrator ensures that your book stands out, leaving a visual impact that complements your written words.
Arrange a book exhibition
Make your own ” Nonfiction ” and prepare the best, in your opinion, books that you would like to present to the general public. Prepare a speech that advertises your chosen books, and let the other guys vote on which of the submitted books they would first take to read. You can sum up at the end: whose selection, whose exhibition “stand” was the most interesting.
A book exhibition can be organized more narrowly: everyone is looking for books on a specific topic, for example, books about the New Year or about school adventures, and preparing a presentation. Whose book is more interesting than all the others?
Play board games based on literary works
There are a lot of such games now. Here are a few that you can keep in your club’s library:
“The Little Prince”
“The Hobbit”
“D’Artagnan and the Three Musketeers ”
“Sherlock Holmes ”
“Around the World in 80 Days»
“Journey to the center of the Earth»
Organize a Book Oscar
It is not necessary to wait for February-March, when the real Oscar takes place. You can arrange your own, and nominate for awards only those books on which films were made over the past year. So the award ceremony will be short-lived. But if you want, you can nominate all the best, in your opinion, film adaptations, and already according to the results of collective voting, choose the best works, the best roles, the best costumes, the best adaptations… I wonder what your statue will look like?
Start a video blog of your club
It’s such an exciting business! Firstly, it is very modern, secondly, it gives the practice of video blogging, and thirdly, it strongly motivates the development of reader literacy. You need to read the book, evaluate, analyze and tell about it on camera in a fascinating and understandable way. Otherwise, you won’t see any subscribers. It’s time for illiterate bloggers to leave, fortunately.
Create cartoons or booktrailers
Not all children want to be in the frame, many prefer voice-over work with videos-ask them to learn how to create cartoons based on certain works or create booktrailers. Especially interesting works can be put forward for competitions and offered to publishers.
Cook dinner according to the recipes of literary books
What did Pippi Longstocking treat her friends to? What did Carlson like to eat? What kind of food was prepared by the mother of Emile? Here, for example, are the topics for a cooking evening based on the books of Astrid Lindgren. It is not necessary to look for Swedish recipes, you can improvise-let the jam for Carlson be ready from the store, if there is no grandmother’s, it is not difficult to prepare pancakes from Pippi yourself. Teenagers can discuss books under any one, but especially important or frequently mentioned treat from the book. For example, heart-shaped waffles for the book “Waffle Heart”. By the way, there is a recipe for them in the book.
Arrange a route through a literary work
If you are lucky enough to live in a city about which a children’s book was written, or even more than one, then you should definitely try to walk through the places that are described in this book. Take photos or shoot your walk for a video blog.
Arrange a museum of book treasures
Any items that are related to books can become exhibits in your museum. For example, magnets, badges with writers that your club members like, postcards with views of literary cities, with images of literary characters, autographs of writers, all kinds of symbols from books such as toys in the form of a Cheshire cat, figurines of a tin soldier… Let your club have a set of rules that govern what you accept into the museum’s exhibition and what you don’t.
