ANNAPOLIS, Md. — The Chesapeake Children’s Museum in Annapolis is hosting events all month long as a part of the National Endowment for the Arts Big Read project.
The project is a federally funded initiative that helps connect communities through the power of a shared reading experience.
Renee Spears offers an experience each Monday morning as part of this program. She said winning the grant for the Big Read program is a huge deal for the museum, helping to give the place more exposure.
Annapolis Children's Museum hosts community reading events for the National Endowment for the Arts project
"I’m really excited about the big Reads program because it helps connect all of the communities and everybody that likes to read. I like to read yes puppy likes to read too so we all get together and we all tried to make sure that everybody gets books and everybody gets to have fun and then you can come to the museum and listen to puppy and I read," Spears said.
"It is the perfect place for children to discover to be creative and to learn, I love of reading to learn a love of learning," Spears said.
Debbie Wood, who runs the Children’s Museum, said the program has another benefit.
"So we’ve made several new partnerships through this event so that’s another benefit of it," Wood said.
Those partnerships have allowed the museum to offer a variety of programming throughout the month, including nature walks, oyster shell shaking, and supporting a tree birthday with the Historic London Town organization.
"So this year in addition to picking a book and saying why we pick that particular book there was an ad on about how we can relate at least two events to the America’s 250," Wood said.
"We celebrate our 200-year-old Willow Oak, which is kind of our unofficial witness to history that has seen a large majority of the United States history so the idea behind it really came out of the 250th anniversary," Anna Kawczynski said.
Wood said she is looking forward to more partnerships in the future.
"Reinforcement of who our community is and how we can best work together what an idea and take our separate resources and put them together and do something even bigger than what we could do alone," Wood said.
The Big Read program hosted by the Chesapeake Children’s Museum ends on May 2.
Some event highlights for families include:
Daily: Take the family to Story Walk with poems from the children’s book at Quiet Waters Park. In collaboration with the Eastport-Annapolis Neck branch of Anne Arundel County Public Libraries.
Mondays: Art and Story Time with Mrs. Spears and Puppy the Puppet and plenty of poetry!
Thursdays: Creek Critters Nature Walk along the trail through woodlands, past wetlands, to the bank of Spa Creek.
Tuesday, Apr. 7: Chesapeake Bay Foundation is hosting a Shell Shaking at the Maryland Oyster Restoration Center in Shady Side.
Friday, April 10: “Bringing Back the Sun” will be presented by Building Better People Productions at Riviera Beach Library.
Saturday & Sunday, April 11-12: Chesapeake Children’s Museum hosts badge-related activities for Girl Scouts of all levels. Check the website for costs and other details.
Sunday, April 12: Enjoy some Poetry Under the Tree at the Anne Arrundell Free School Museum. This can be your family’s starting point to honoring our country’s upcoming 250th birthday. The preserved schoolhouse, with retired teachers from Anne Arundel County Public Schools as its caretakers, was built in 1723! There will be crafts as well as poetry reading and a discussion of the BigRead book for adults.
Sunday, April 12: Nature is the theme for a performance by the students of Davy Dance Academy (location in north county to be announced).
Monday, April 13: “Bringing Back the Sun” children’s theater performance by Building Better People Productions at Chesapeake Children’s Museum.
Tuesday, April 14: Chesapeake Bay Foundation presents a virtual Green Careers Panel for teens and other career explorers. What are all the jobs that support the natural world?
Wednesday, April 15: Poetry Writing Workshop at St. John’s College for teens to adults. This is another America250 historic site, established in 1636.
Saturday, Apr 18: One Hundred Trees at the Captain Avery Museum. The South Country Seed Collective will present herb activities and distribute seeds and seedlings including strawberry plants! Watershed Stewards Academy is contributing the Tree Giveaway (yes, 100 trees). There will be a display of children’s books from Deale Library. Student poets can contribute original poetry.
Saturday, April 18: Earth Day Festival at Quiet Waters Park with dozens of earth conscious vendors and organizations. Free park admission on this day.
Saturday, April 18: Take a tour of the trail at Mulberry Hill with Breaking Boundaries Environmental. The company’s mission includes fostering conservation, educating future environmentalists, and ensuring public access to the land and water of the Chesapeake Bay Watershed.
Saturday & Sunday, April 18-19: A Tree Birthday Party celebrates the oldest tree (200+ years) at Historic Londontown and Gardens. There will be garden and tree themed crafts, scavenger hunts, games, other exciting activities and, of course, birthday cake! Environmental organizations will be on hand to share what they do to protect nature.
Sunday, April 19: Trees Badge workshop for Cadette Girl Scouts at Chesapeake Children’s Museum.
Tuesday, April 21: This one is for night owls. Join a Meteor Shower Watch at Carr’s-Elktonia Beach – wa-a-ay after dark! Bring a beach blanket or beach chairs.
Wednesday, April 22: Severn River Association leads an Invasive Species plant removal at Chesapeake Children’s Museum.
Friday, April 24: Turn the poutiest of frowns upside down with this musical featuring whimsical puppets and live performers in a sweeping oceanic adventure. “Tale of the Pout-Pout Fish” will be performed at Maryland Hall.
Saturday, April 25: GreenScape is happening at multiple sites around the City of Annapolis. Help to plant some plants in public spaces! Girl Scout Juniors can earn the Gardener badge at Chesapeake Children’s Museum.
Tuesday, April 28: Pipefish and Poetry is a fish-catching poetry workshop with Arundel Rivers Federation. Seine for shoreline critters and use poetry building blocks to create your own odes to the critters that were caught.
Saturday, May 2: Bring a blanket or beach chairs to take in the “Sleeping Beauty Ballet” on the St. John’s College campus lawn.
Saturday, May 2: El día de los niños/El día de los libros – Children’s Day /Book Day at Chesapeake Children’s Museum will have pony rides, Mexican cuisine, live music, traditional Latin American crafts and a book giveaway!
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