A.L. Public Library encourages families to read together for Book Lovers Month

The Albert Lea Public Library is rolling out a new program to encourage families to read during Book Lovers Month in February.

Called Family Reads, the program will begin Feb. 4 and continue through March 15.

Children’s Librarian Patti Greibrok said she hopes it will be a way to engage all family members and to help children get excited about reading.

“We have to be good role models,” Greibrok said. “Children do as they see, not always as they’re told. If children see their parents reading, they’re more likely to become readers, too.”

Families participating can sign up for the program as teams with the library card of one family member. Children and adults alike will log the minutes they read each day on the library’s website, and for every 60 minutes of reading, they will get a raffle ticket.

Family members in other communities or even across the country can participate, Greibrok said.

The more people read, the more raffle tickets they get and the higher chance they have to win a gift basket. There will be five or six themed prize baskets sponsored by the Friends of the Albert Lea Public Library.

She said the library has not done much for Book Lovers Month in the past and came up with the idea in hopes it would be a way to get parents and children to read together.

“The more worlds a child hears at a young age when they can’t really even comprehend what the words mean, the more they will know when they come into school,” Greibrok said.

She plans to send out information about the program to each of the schools in the community.

Book Lovers Month also coincides with a community book read of “To Kill A Mockingbird” sponsored by the Human Rights Commission and the Freeborn County Choose Civility organization.

Human Rights Commission member Mary Laeger-Hagemeister said students in 10th-grade English classes should be reading the book at about the same time, and she hopes to engage them as well.

“It’d be a great opportunity for parents or grandparents whose children are reading it, to read it with them and have a discussion,” Laeger-Hagemeister said.

Members of the commission and the Choose Civility organization will lead a discussion about the book at Prairie Wind Coffee from 6:30 to 8 p.m. Feb. 21.

“We’re encouraging anyone to read the book and then come to the dialogue,” Laeger-Hagemeister said.

A movie of the book will be shown March 7 at the Marion Ross Performing Arts Center. Multiple copies of the book are available at the library.