Special thanks to Rachael Walker, Outreach Consultant for Reading Rockets, for providing this post.

Everybody’s getting ready to drop everything and read on April 12, Beverly Cleary’s 92nd birthday and National DEAR Day! Some folks are getting a head start, like all the readers at Brush Creek Elementary School in Eagle, Colorado who will read on the morning of April 11. Others are planning to celebrate on Saturday, like the Damascus Branch Library in Montgomery County, Maryland, where there will be “Sundaes on Saturday” to following DEAR time. And in big city of New York, they do things big, so DEAR will be a day long event in Central Park! The New York Public Library and BookSwim along with HarperCollins Children’s Books, is hosting a day of family reading fun, prizes and celebrity readers.

How will you celebrate DEAR Day? Read on for some great ideas!

You could:

• Encourage your family and other families to designate a special time to “drop everything and read” at home. The goal of National D.E.A.R. Day is to have families take a break from their busy routine and sit together and read as a family. Look for titles for families to share at www.dropeverythingandread.com.

• Listen to Beverly Cleary at Reading Rockets in an exclusive new interview featuring questions from her readers. Families who love Ramona, Henry Huggins and other characters created by Mrs. Cleary will enjoy hearing answers to questions like “Did you ever cut the arm off of one of your teddy bears to see if there were bones inside?” and “What happened to some of your characters when they grew up?”

• Wax poetic. April is National Poetry Month, a great time to express how you feel about reading! D.E.A.R. stands for Drop Everything and Read—but what else do the letters D, E, A, and R inspire? Have your students or your family members write a D.E.A.R. acrostic poem that tells their own reading story—about a favorite book, place to read, or reader—such as:

Dad
Every night he reads to me
Actually it’s
Really fun

Books are so enDEARing! What will you be reading on April 12?