Nebraska Students Invited to Write Letters to Favorite Authors
Call for Student Entries!

Letters About Literature, a national reading and writing promotion program of the Center for the Book in the Library of Congress, in partnership with Target,  invites young readers in grades 4 – 12 to enter this year’s Letters About Literature letter writing competition. Young readers simply write a personal letter to an author explaining on that author’s work somehow changed the readers’ view of their world.

Letters About Literature awards both state and national prizes on three competition levels: Level 1 for grades 4 – 6; Level 2 for grades 7 – 8; and Level 3 for grades 9 – 12. Six national winners will each receive cash awards and will nominate a school or community library to receive a $10,000 LAL Reading Promotion grant. Twelve national honor winners will likewise receive cash awards and also nominate a school or community library to receive a $1,000 LAL Reading Promotion grant. Nebraska winners are honored in a Proclamation-signing ceremony and receive cash awards and gift certificates.

Teachers, librarians, and parents can download free teaching materials on reader response and reflective writing at www.lettersaboutliterature.org. Submission deadline is postmark December 12, 2009. State winners will be notified in March 2010 and national winners by mid-April. Nebraska-specific information (including letters from Nebraska winners of past contests) is available at http://www.nebraska.gov/publications/lal/aboutcontest.html. Letters About Literature is sponsored in Nebraska by the Nebraska Center for the Book and the Nebraska Library Commission, with support from Houchen Bindery Ltd. and Lee Booksellers.

Letters About Literature supports national standards for teaching language arts & reading as recommended by the National Council of Teachers of English and the International Reading Association.

Special Events for teens are listed on our Teen Cafe.