The Arkansas Department of Education and the Arkansas Elementary Council 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 your school 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 1999-00 list in order to vote. It should be made clear to the children that they 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.
Enclosed is a ballot (Form 1) to be reproduced by your school 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 faxed to 501-682-9026 or e-mailed to kghidotti@arkedu.k12.ar.us no later than Friday, April 14, 2000. Form 3 has been enclosed for you to submit titles to be considered by the Arkansas Diamond Reading Committee for the 2001-2002 reading list. The copyright date must be 1999.
The 2000-2001 Arkansas Diamond Primary Book Award Reading List of books published in 1998 is enclosed for your convenience.
The results of this years Arkansas Diamond Primary Book Award will be posted in May 2000.