THE SHREVE MEMORIAL LIBRARY TAKES 2ND GRADERS ON A BRAND NEW READING ADVENTURE WITH, PETE THE CAT
It’s Pete the Cat’s first time at Shreveport Regional Arts Council’s ArtBreak, but is he worried? Goodness No! Pete is at the Shreveport Convention Center with the
Shreve Memorial Library to bring a brand new reading adventure to all Caddo Parish 2nd grade students attending ArtBreak 37. Pete and the staff of the Shreve Memorial Library want to make reading fun to encourage students to make it a lifelong activity and to obtain a public library card. Pete is helping the library staff by singing, acting out one of his books on stage, and telling a story to show everyone that reading is more than a school subject. You can read almost anywhere—on the school bus, in the classroom, in the library, the lunchroom, on the playground, and at home. Reading is cool! It’s all good!
Samantha Bonnette, Shreve Memorial Library Marketing & Development Manager says, “ArtBreak allows Shreve Memorial Library to do outreach and connect with Caddo Parish students to promote library resources to a captive audience. It’s a great way for us to encourage reading while celebrating the arts. The idea behind ArtBreak, promoting the arts and reading at the Second Grade Reading Adventure, dovetails nicely with Shreve Memorial Library’s mission to provide services, resources, and support to create a better world. It is a great partnership, with SRAC and one we look forward to each year.”
The 2nd Grade Reading Experience is key to advancing reading in students by presenting reading in a different style. By combining reading with other Arts, students are shown that not only is reading essential and important, but it is also fun and can open up a world of other possibilities, even adventure. Pete the Cat is a very musical feline and almost all of his books include a song. The Shreve Memorial Library staff has developed hands-on musical S.T.E.A.M. activities students can make--a hand drum, a tambourine, and maracas-- so they can take part in the musical narrative. Students are captivated by the sounds and the story. They want to rock with Pete as he goes from room to room in his school shoes. The hands-on percussion-making experience lets the students quite literally become a part of the story and keeps them engaged. They can also use the instruments when they rock with children’s drumcussionist Uncle Devin on another ArtBreak stage.
And if all this doesn’t make you love books and reading more than ever, the Shreve Memorial Library Friends are adding the icing to the cake with a book walk throughout the ArtBreak weekend, April 21-23, with books as the prizes rather than the usual cakes in a cake walk. It’s a great way to feed your love for reading.
