It’s been a bumper summer for youngsters in Aldeburgh who’ve been taking part in the Mischief Makers reading challenge.
A record 40 youngsters were able to complete this year’s event which is designed to encourage children to keep reading throughout the summer break while they are away from school.
Yesterday a celebration event was held at the library to mark the achievements of those who had completed the challenge: with medals and certificates being handed out.
Author and illustrator Emma Chichester Clark was on hand to present the awards to the successful participants.
Ahead of her visit many of the children had been reading her book’s which include the Blue Kangaroo series and Plumdog which is based on her own dog Plum who came along for the event.
“It’s brilliant,” said Ms Chichester Clark, “anything that encourages children to read is wonderful.”
To complete the challenge youngsters had to read at least six books from the library. By reading the books those taking part were able to earn stickers and other incentives.
Some of those taking part went over and beyond the amount of books required for challenge however, with one child reading 22 books over the summer.
The annual scheme is run nationally by The Reading Agency and helps three quarters of a million children get into libraries.
Each year the challenge adopts a new theme. This year Beano and Dennis the Menace were the main themes of the challenge to tie in with the 80th anniversary of Beano itself.
As part of the scheme youngsters had to explore a map of Beanotown to find the mysterious buried treasure and becomeamischief maker.
Sue Osben, the library manager at Aldeburgh Library was pleased with this year’s results.
“It is really good because we are only a small library.
“It’s probably the highest number we have had.”
She said that it had been nice for the volunteers at the library to have the youngsters sharing their excitement about the books they had been reading during the challenge.
“We have had lots of books about witches and fairies and dragons,” said Ms Osben.
The theme for the 2019 challenge will be announced next year.
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