Summer reading challenges…

aren’t just for kids.

Remember when we were kids, back in the day (LOL), and summer rolled around and before you left school for the summer you were handed a SUMMER READING LIST that you had to complete before school started up again in the Fall? Older grades were also charged with writing a book report for their favorite book read during the summer break.

The purpose of this “challenge” was to keep kids reading during the months off from school so they wouldn’t lose the momentum of reading. My grade school even did a math challenge just to ensure we didn’t lose any of our skills learned during the year – which is a proven fact happens to kids at certain ages if they don’t keep “practicing” what they’ve learned.

I loved those reading lists.

On the first day of vacay I would march to the local library and take out three of the books on my list at a time. I was always a fast reader, so I usually blew through my summer list before July ended, wrote my report – in longhand because we didn’t have laptops back then. Yes, I am a cusp-boomer/gen X baby – and then would keep going back to the library to read other books by some of the fav authors I’d discovered with the list.

Judy Blume. Carloyn Keene. Beverly Cleary. Roald Dahl ( although as an adult I learned about how problematic he was), Laura Ingalls Wilder. These were all on my list as I moved from grade school to middle school. I think this summer, 1971, I read every book these fabulous authors had in print – all gleaned from the library.

Do kids still have summer reading challenges and lists these days? I wonder. I don’t have little kids running around my house anymore, but I know my daughter had a list when she was in grade school in the 1990s.

The funny thing is, as an adult, I still love a summer reading challenge and a summer reading list, and I make one every year. Typically, because it’s vacation time for most of the developed world, time devoted to recreational reading goes up in the summer. With the birth of the Kindle, Nook, and the capability to read on any device you own, plus audiobooks, people on vacation no longer have to lug pounds of print books in their luggage when they travel. You can pack thousands of books, with no added weight, right into your carryon. And you can read anywhere! Beach, boat, plane, cabin in the woods, tent.

Do you have a summer reading list? Do you like them?

Here’s a hint for those of you who never know when a new book is being released. If you are on GOODREADS, you can scroll to the menu and hit BROWSE. You’ll see a dropdown choice titled NEW RELEASES. You can even specify for which type of book your searching. Once you drag down to the upcoming releases, you can scroll through the next four months to see when new books are coming out, again filtering down to what you typically like to read. Or even if you are looking for a new genre to tackle.

I do this weekly (yes, I am a little obsessed!) because I don’t ever want to miss a book by one of my one click authors. Since the books are divided into the months they will be out in the world, it’s easy to make a summer reading list for yourself.

Or a Fall one.

Or even a Winter list.

Yeah…I’m obsessed!

Summer reading challenges. They’re so much fun.

Now…go read, peeps.

~Peg