The Arkansas Department of Education and the Arkansas State Library are pleased to announce the annual selection process for a book to receive the Arkansas Diamond Primary Book award. The book to receive this award will be selected in April by students in kindergarten, first, second, and third grades. It is hoped that students in the schools have been participating in reading these books, and that teachers and library media specialists have selected some titles for reading aloud. Please note that children in Grades K-3 will need to have read or heard read at least three of the books from the 2005-2006 list in order to vote. It should be made clear to the children that each one may vote for only one title.
Because of the age group involved in the Diamond Primary Book Award, the reading committee suggests that when books are read to children, the teacher or library media specialists may wish to devise a plan for helping the children vote on the books. This may be done by reading all the books to the children in a condensed amount of time and then asking the children to vote, or the books may have been read to the children over an extended period of time but a review of the books may be necessary for children to vote. Young children may have forgotten some of the books if the books were read at the beginning of the year.
Attached is a ballot (Form 1) to be reproduced by the schools and used by the students to vote. The votes should then be tallied in each school and totals for each title should be indicated on Form 2. Then, Form 2 should be mailed to the address at the bottom of the form by no later than Friday, April 7, 2006. Form 3 has been enclosed to submit titles to be considered by the Arkansas Diamond Reading Committee for the 2007-2008 reading list. The copyright date must be 2005.
The new 2006-2007 Arkansas Diamond Primary Book Award Reading List of books published in 2004 is attached..
The results of this year’s Arkansas Diamond Primary Book Award will be posted in May 2006.