This year, I want to give you plenty of time to prepare for what might be one of the most important celebrations ever: Children's Book Week 2012! It's set to take place in Australia from Saturday 18 to Friday 24 August. The theme for 2012 is Champions Read. Here are some Book Chook ideas for learning activities you and your children/students might participate in to celebrate Children's Book Week 2012. Read some of the short-listed books at the Children's Book Council of Australia website. You'll also find reviews at The Book Chook of For All Creatures, No Bears, Look, a Book! and The Last Viking. Write your own book review about one of the notable or short-listed books. Not sure how to get started? Check out How Do Kids Write a Book Review. Organize a Readathon for your school, (perhaps to raise money for purchasing much-needed new books for your school library!) and have each student record the number of books he/she can read within a certain time frame eg four weeks. Design certificates for gold, silver and bronze readers. Champions Read. There's no doubt about that! But what else could champion readers do with books? Consider inter-class contests where kids must build the tallest book tower, or set up a book-domino display. You could try writing a very short story using book titles, or even creating a haiku from book spines. Check out some examples at 100 Scope Notes. Use a video camera to capture footage of all these great events, or wrote an article about them for the school newsletter or website. What other book-related contests can you dream up? How about a read-aloud marathon where classes nominate their champions and the champs go head-to-head? Can your school set up a world record breaking attempt like these schools in London? Investigate the Guinness World Record website for more book and reading ideas. If you have a reading contest, here is a free downloadable template for an award winner certificate. Okay, so we know champions read. Who else reads? Do ducks read? Do elephants read? Or crabs? Or unicorns? If they did read, what books do you think they would like? Would your animal hero have any problems with reading? How could these be overcome? Can you create a simple picture book for a younger child about an animal character who reads? Extra marks if your animal hero is also a champion reader! DLTK Custom Bookmarks Here's a website where you can use templates to help make your own bookmarks: DLTK's Custom bookmarks. You just need to choose the options you want by clicking a radio button. I chose double-sided to make my dino-mite bookmark! Tell a friend or relative about your favourite book of all time. Try to persuade them to read it too. Write a book review about your favourite book of all time. If you're not sure how to get started, find help in my article, How Do Kids Write a Book Review? Create a board game based on your favourite book of all time. Take a look at different board games to find a style or format you like, then come up with something unique of your own. You could include quiz cards with questions about literature, or chance cards with literary fates eg "You fall off wall and all the King's Horses can't put you together. Go back to start." You might even create a board game based on Champions Read! Discuss what make a good book. What makes a bad book? Get together with some friends and invent the world's worst book title. Improvise an advertisement to trick people into buying that book. You might like to learn about methods advertisers use first. Perform your ads for an audience in a school assembly, another class or a family member. Use Big Huge Labs to make some simple posters, signs and other fun items with images. Create a Nota or Glogster about your favourite books and share it on your class blog or school website. Design some posters or signs for your classroom or library about champions reading. Let your imagination go wild. Your poster could include famous people, book characters, animals, champions on the sporting field, or even you - reading! At top is a poster I found on Wikimedia Commons, then adapted for the Champions Read theme by adding text boxes and clip art. Or try ArtSkills' online poster maker.

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