Book Bash! Celebrate~ this week

Thank you @Ruth_Ayers of Ruth Writes for this wonderful #Celebratelu! It's so refreshing to end the week reflecting on the celebrations. You can read more celebrations at Discover.Play.Build. or follow #celebratelu on twitter.

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It's a Book Bash! 
This week I am celebrating a reading reunion.  I had been toying with the idea of inviting my kids (from last year) to come together to share our summer reading.  When I mentioned this to my oldest daughter she quickly replied, "I would've loved that as first grader!"  This was all I needed to take the dive!

Our Book Bash was held in the neighborhood park of our school. This park was perfect because most families could walk over and it's all green space- not one piece of playground equipment! (I was afraid the playground equipment would have been strong competition.)  It was so nice to see kids walking, biking, or scootering over to our Book Bash.  Some with their dogs, some with  younger siblings and all with parents and books.  As I watched families walk over  I knew that today reading was the topic of the day, families had planned for this, kids had chosen books to bring and we were set up for a successful Book Bash, my heart was filled with pride!





As families gathered hugs were shared, squeals were heard and books were EVERYWHERE!  The kids were eager to share their books and quickly spread out their blankets and gathered with other readers. I flipped off my flip flops and began to go from blanket to blanket sharing and reading with my class, just like readers do naturally.  the kids were so adorable pulling book after book from thier book bags "I can read this one too you Mrs. Frazier, or "Look, I got this one from the library." A few even shared books they had brought because they wanted to share it with a specific reader, "Mrs. Frazier I brought this one because it's a graphic novel and I know you like these kinds of books!"

As I watched and listened to these proud readers impressed with their book choices, talk about stories and characters, strategies they pulled naturally from their tool belts and their excitement in sharing reading with others!   These young readers are well on their way to being life long readers! So what happens along the way that these readers loose this enthuasium for reading!  In Donalyn Miller's book Reading in the Wild she shares startling information about readers loosing this joy and becoming embarrassed about reading and strategies we as teachers and a community can use to cultivate life long readers.  You can help grow readers for life and join our Wild Readers Scavenger Hunt, #letsbringreadingback!

The Book Bash was a success the parents and the kids were excited and many asked if we could do it again before school starts,  I think this was the first annual Book Bash!