summer {reading}

After school ending, Little Bit breaking her arm, sister's baby shower, family vacation and then a garage sale, I can finally say things are calming down around here...lol!  Summer is here...which means it's time for some summer reading!  Our local library has a summer reading program each year.  Kids can read for prizes.  You have to read or be read to for so many minutes a day.  In Little Bits age level it is 15 minutes a day.  There are prizes you can earn after reading for X number of minutes.  We did this last year and she had a blast.  This year I thought I would add another twist to get Little Bit more into the reading time. 

I came across this pin about a summer reading incentive program and thought it looked like something Little Bit would enjoy.  There are printables that you can download and print after subscribing to HowDoesShe.  I printed the Bingo and the coupons, but made my own Reading Star banner.  The one in the download was just too big for where I was going to use it.  I just cut some pennants out of white cardstock...which I should have made more colorful!...and hung them up on our white board.  One just says {reading star}.  The others are to write names of books that we read together. 

Once I told Little Bit about the Bingo she couldn't wait to get started!  It has lots of different ideas of places, days, etc. to read.  For example: wearing a hat, sitting in your favorite chair, on a Monday or under a tree.  Once we complete an item from the Bingo card, we mark it off with a dot marker....just cause they are fun to use! 

 

Here she is reading in her bed.  This was the first space she got to mark off on her bingo card.  What we have been doing is the hubs or I read to her for 15 minutes, she looks for some words that she knows and then has time to browse the books on her own.  

Then once she completes a row she gets to select a prize coupon.  I wrote different "prizes" on the coupons for her to earn.  A few are: get a new book, go bowling, see a movie in the theater...then when she fills in the whole board the grand prize ticket is a trip to the water park.  This is an extra special treat because we didn't get season passes this year and she will have her cast off  in a few weeks and be sooooo ready to jump and play in the water! 

She is one away from earning her first prize already....can't wait to see what she picks!