“Children Read” Project launched in Novosibirsk Region

Employees of the Novosibirsk Regional Center of the Presidential Library under the Novosibirsk State Regional Research Library, are taking part in “Children Read” Project, which is implemented by the Novosibirsk Library Society with the support of the Presidential Grants Foundation, the Ministry of Culture of Novosibirsk Region and the Ministry of Education of Novosibirsk Region.

 “Children Read” Project is aimed at attracting children of secondary school age to reading. As part of the joint work of libraries and educational organizations in the region, they held a series of events where the children were introduced to the works of modern national and foreign authors.

During the preparatory stage was formed a list of recommended reading materials, which included such works as “Sugar Child” by Olga Gromova, “Manyunya” by Narine Abgaryan, “Wafer Heart” by Maria Parr, “35 kilos of Hope” by Anna Gavald and many others. By compiling the list, the organizers wanted to expand the reading horizons of children, parents and librarians, to show them new authors and works that create a world understandable to the modern child, raise pressing problems for the teenager.

The main stage of “Children Read” Project consisted of two stages.

The first one was “My Favorite Book” Essay Contest on proposed texts from the list of references. Out of more than 850 submitted essays, 314 best works were selected, 15 authors were among the winners, five schoolchildren became prize-awardees of the contest.

The second stage of the project provided a video with the story of each winner of the contest about the book chosen for composing. Before video filming for the children, they organized master classes “I want to tell you” in teaching public speaking skills and transforming the texts of the essays into short presentation materials. The final video is available for viewing on the YouTube Channel of the Novosibirsk State Regional Research Library.

The project also includes a round table “Teenager and a Book: Dialogue in the Library and School Space”, which brought together staff of regional and municipal libraries, representatives of educational institutions in the region, experts in children's literature and reading, as well as the organizers of the “My Favorite Book" Essay Contest.

The themes of the event were “Reading as a sociological and philological problem”, “Organization of children's reading and interaction of cultural and educational institutions in this process”, “Organization and holding of “My Favorite Book” Essay Contest, held in the framework of the regional project “Children Read”, and participation experience in it. Experts discussed, in particular, who form the circle of reading of a modern child, how in the digital era to attract potential readers to a paper book, how to promote books in a teenage environment and other important issues.

Following the results of the round table, recommendations for educational institutions and libraries to promote reading among schoolchildren were made.

The Presidential Library’s portal features Novosibirsk Region: Pages of History collection, which includes books, periodicals, archive documents and graphic materials reflecting the geographical, administrative, territorial, economic and other aspects of the history of Novosibirsk Region of the period XVIII - first half of the XX century as well as the current Statute of the region.

Based on materials of https://ngonb.ru/ portal.