Please welcome picture book author and elementary school librarian Nadine Poper to Frog on a Blog!

Nadine serves on the committee for the Pennsylvania Young Reader’s Choice Award. She’s stopped by today to share a bit about this special award, sponsored by the Pennsylvania School Librarians Association, that allows the students to vote for their favorite books.

PA Young Reader’s Choice Award (sponsored by PSLA)

By Nadine Poper-committee member

The students of Pennsylvania are gearing up to vote in their very own book award, the Pennsylvania Young Reader’s Choice Award (PYRCA). There are 4 lists created each year by 24 PA school librarians, grades K-3, 3-6, 6-8, and YA. Each list has 15 books on which students can vote for their favorite, one per list. The book with the most votes from each list is the winner. The votes are cast by the students of Pennsylvania. 

The lists are carefully balanced to include all genres: picture books, poetry, chapter books, middle grade, biographies, and nonfiction, as well as a variety of topics and characters that will appeal to both boys and girls and that celebrate various cultures. 

Students will place their votes by March 15, and the winning books are revealed at the annual Pennsylvania School Librarians (PSLA) Conference. Winning authors from the previous year often attend the awards breakfast at the conference to receive their recognition. 

School libraries across the Commonwealth participate by purchasing the books for their collections, sharing the book talks, book trailers, and lesson ideas with their students.  The book talks and lesson ideas are created by the committee members so that teachers and librarians have resources at their fingertips. 

One lesson idea, for example, that I incorporate with my elementary students involves students taking on the roles of animals in the ocean and demonstrating the break down in the food chain as discussed in If Sharks Disappeared by Lily Williams. 

My students enjoy participating each year because it is a book award where their voice matters. I do a big Caldecott and Newbery award unit also, which we have so much fun with as well. However, the kids know that those awards are chosen by adults, where as the PA Young Reader’s Choice Award is all about what they like the most. 

Here’s a small sampling of titles to be voted on this year:

For more information and to see a complete list of all 2018-2019 books, visit the PYRCA website here.

Most states have their own children’s book awards. Click here for the current list in your state. 

Nadine Poper is an elementary school librarian for an urban PA school district, a mom to 3 amazing young men, a wiener dog owner, and foster mom for homeless dachshunds. 

She uses the proceeds from her dachshund picture books to help support dachshund rescue. As a school librarian, Nadine serves on the committee for the PA Young Reader’s Choice Award. Nadine’s traditionally published debut picture book PORCUPETTE AND MOPPET will be released June 2019 by Blue Whale Press.

Her second picture book, RANDALL AND RANDALL, will be released Fall 2019.  Visit her at www.nadinepoper.weebly.com.