Children’s Literature Festival Set for April 17

Truman will host almost 1,400 fourth-, fifth- and sixth-grade students for the annual Children’s Literature Festival, 9 a.m.-2:15 p.m. April 17 in the Student Union Building.     
                                    
Visiting authors and illustrators include John David Anderson, Claire Caterer, Jody Feldman, Helen Frost, Wendy Anderson Halperin, Jane Kurtz, Lisa McMann, Joanne Rocklin, Laurel Snyder, J.A. White and Allan Wolf.  

Students will participate in 30-minute sessions with the guest authors and illustrators. All children attending must be pre-registered.

University faculty, staff, students and other interested adults are welcome at any of the sessions. To register, contact Daisy Rearick at drearick@truman.edu or call 660.785.4048.

Anyone interested is welcome to attend an informal meeting and book signing with the authors and illustrators from 3-4 p.m. in the Student Union Building Conference Room (SUB 3000). Refreshments will be served.

The festival will conclude with a dinner at 6 p.m. in the Student Union Building Activities Room. The dinner is limited to pre-registered adults and children accompanied by an adult. The cost of the dinner is $11.50. To register, contact Rearick at 660.785.4048. At 7 p.m. author John David Anderson will give a presentation. Dinner registration is requested by April 10.

The Children’s Literature Festival was an annual event for 21 years. Due to budget cuts, the festival was discontinued in 2004. A Children’s Literature Festival Fund was started in 2007 in an effort to bring it back, and the Festival returned in 2009. For more information about the fund, contact the Office of Advancement at 660.785.4133 or giving.truman.edu/SpecialInitiatives/ChildrensLiteratureFestival.

Pickler Memorial Library is sponsoring the festival with financial support from the Freeman Foundation, Follett High Education Group--Truman State University Bookstore and the Truman State University Foundation. Additional information may be obtained from Sharon Hackney, 660.785.7366, or the Children’s Literature Festival webpage.

The authors’ books are available at the Truman State University Bookstore.