Rocket into reading

Local children from around the District are having a blast at the Taupo Library’s ‘Rocket into Reading’ annual summer reading programme.

Every year the Library’s summer reading programme is extremely popular and this year has been no different with 80 local kids, between the ages of 5 and 13, signing up for a summer of reading. The programme is designed to promote reading as a fun recreational activity and to encourage children to continue reading and maintain their reading levels over the school break.

Outer Space is this year’s theme which has inspired an area of the temporary library on Totara Street to be transformed into an outer space airlock which the kids have to climb through. Throughout the programme the youngsters are completing set tasks such as creating space rocks, geometric space stations and even robots.

The summer reading kids were among the first to use the District’s new mobile library which provided extra space and flexibility for the programme and was decorated to align with the spacey theme. It has been used at the Great Lake Centre and has made trips out to participants in Mangakino for the first time.

TKMP Chairman Kathryn Uvhagen says she was pleased to see the reading programme embark on another exciting project. “The summer reading programme is a great educational activity for our young people over the school holidays.”

“Not only is it a great way to improve reading skills but it stimulates creativity and makes reading fun,” says Councillor Uvhagen.