Summer reading season is coming up! Librarians know that a great way to promote the library’s resources, encourage young patrons to read more, and help prevent the dreaded “summer slide” is to put on engaging summer reading programs. Infobase has a variety of engaging content you can use as part of these programs, from animated versions of the storybooks you most likely have on your shelves, to eBooks of great literary classics, to fun and informative videos to help your patrons learn more about great books and the authors who wrote them.
Content for Younger Summer Readers
Got any fans of Arthur or the Berenstain Bears in your community? Just for Kids streaming media for public libraries features numerous cartoons based on popular children’s book series that you can use in conjunction with the books themselves. Consider introducing a series to your young patrons by showing them an episode of it and then showing them where in the library the books are located so they can read more.
Some of these cartoons include:
- The Berenstain Bears (Item #79830; available in the U.S. and Canada)
- Franklin the Turtle (Item #79831; available in the U.S. and Canada)
- Dr. Seuss (Item #66571; available in the U.S. and Canada)
- Redwall (Item #79833; available in the U.S. and Canada)
- And more!
Just for Kids also features animated versions of popular children’s storybooks from publishers such as Vooks and Weston Woods. Children can watch these videos while reading the book to help bolster their reading skills. Some of these videos come with lesson plans as well that homeschooling parents can use in their summer lessons.
Here are just a few animated storybooks you can find on Just for Kids:
- Benji, the Bad Day, and Me (Vooks, Item #279689)
- A Boy Like You (Vooks, Item #279683)
- Beautiful Shades of Brown (Vooks, Item #279688)
- Monster Needs One More (Vooks, Item #279711)
- Ronnie and His Grit (Vooks, Item #279720; includes lesson plan)
- Knuffle Bunny: A Cautionary Tale (Weston Woods, Item #184210; available in the U.S. and Canada)
- Helen’s Big World: The Life of Helen Keller (Weston Woods, Item #184200; available in the U.S. and Canada)
- Goldilocks and the Three Dinosaurs (Weston Woods, Item #184197; available in the U.S. and Canada)
- A House for Hermit Crab (Weston Woods, Item #184202; available in the U.S. and Canada)
- Who Says Women Can’t Be Doctors? (Weston Woods, Item #184218; available in the U.S. and Canada)
In addition, Just for Kids also features episodes of the beloved series Reading Rainbow (Item #66460; available in the U.S. and Canada) to introduce young readers to books they might not have read yet. Hosted by LeVar Burton, Reading Rainbow takes kids on real-life journeys with celebrity guest readers and “Kid on the Street” book recommendations.
Content for Readers Middle School and Up
If your library subscribes to Bloom’s Literature, then many summer readers who are interested in the classics can use their library cards to access more than 1,000 full-text classic works online in eBook format. These books, most of which were selected from Bloom’s Literary Canon, include the essential works of the most important authors in world history and literature. These titles include:
- All of William Shakespeare’s plays
- The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald
- Little Women by Louisa May Alcott
- Dracula by Bram Stoker
- Great Expectations, A Tale of Two Cities, Oliver Twist, and more by Charles Dickens
- Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë
- Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë
- Moby-Dick by Herman Melville
- Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde and Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson
- Les Misérables by Victor Hugo
- The Adventures of Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain
- And hundreds more!
Summer readers will not only find these classic works in Bloom’s, but they’ll also find articles on the books’ authors and characters for more in-depth research, plus a wide range of reference essays and scholarly criticism to help them get a broader perspective on what they’re reading.
In addition, Access Video On Demand features thousands of videos on language and literature patrons can easily find via the Subjects menu in the three-line drop-down menu as well as via an app available for Apple iOS and Android. Summer readers can find videos unveiling the inspiration behind great works of literature and explaining how the classics became regarded as such, as well as both short videos and documentaries on the lives of renowned authors. Here are just a few you can find:
- The Secret Life of Books, Series 1 (DCD Rights Limited, Item #75350; available in the U.S.) and 2 (Item #114424; available in the U.S. and Canada)
- The Great American Read series (PBS, Item #191944; available in the U.S. and Canada)
- Jack London: An American Adventure (Kwanza, Item #145553)
- Sherlock Holmes: Unravel the Mystery (MVD, Item #215621)
- Rudyard Kipling: A Secret Life (MVD, Item #239097; available in the U.S. and Canada)
- Hemingway: A Film by Ken Burns and Lynn Novick (PBS, Item #240905)
- In Search of Walt Whitman series (Andrew Kaplan, Item #210884)
- And more!
Both Bloom’s Literature and Access Video On Demand have hundreds of engaging performance videos of great literary works—including the plays of William Shakespeare, classic Greek plays, adaptations of classic novels from PBS’s Masterpiece, and more—that really bring them to life and can help summer readers pick up on details they may have missed while reading the works.
Subscribers, want to see this content for yourself? Log into Just for Kids, Bloom’s Literature, and Access Video On Demand today!
Not a subscriber? Why not take a FREE trial?
See also:
- FREE webinar: Ready, Set, Library Marketing!
- Encourage Girls to Be Mighty with Infobase
- Learn “How to Write about Literature” with Bloom’s Literature
- FREE webinar: Seamless Streaming on Demand: The Infobase Approach to Video Collection Development
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