On Saturday, April 11, Veterans Park in Porterville, California, filled with children and their parents commemorating the 25th anniversary of Porterville Celebrates Reading.
The annual community event emphasizes the importance of literacy. Schools and community groups come together each year to promote reading and literacy, even for the youngest children. And each child choses a free book to add to his or her home library.
Patience Christenson, who is a member of the Porterville Ward in the Porterville California Stake of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, has been the event’s committee chair since 2022.
“Our local Relief Society sisters have been involved with Porterville Celebrates Reading since its founding around 1993, though it became recognized by the city in 2000, so I am just continuing the legacy started by them,” Christenson said.
The founder, the late Margaret Slattery, believed that literacy started in the home and had a goal of every child having their own home library. Two of her friends, Debbie Stockton and Catherine May, are members of the Church and also heavily involved in the event, Christenson said.
Literacy has long been a priority for the Relief Society. In 1991, the Relief Society launched literacy programs among at-risk communities. And the list of 25 ways that women can be involved in the Relief Society’s global efforts to care for women and children includes these suggestions:
- Support the literacy and education of women and children by identifying and combating barriers in the community.
- Help children read aloud. Nothing improves children’s cognitive skills more than reading with adults who care about them.
Every year at the Porterville Celebrates Reading event, local schools, nonprofits and community organizations assemble booths that are completely free to all participants. When the children arrive, they are given a red “passport,” shaped like a stop sign to match the event logo of “Stop and read to your child.”
Children walk from booth to booth, listen to a story and then participate in a craft or activity. After each booth, a hole is punched in their passport. Once they have eight hole punches, they can go and pick out a free book for their home library.
“This year we had 38 booths participate and 475 passports turned in,” Christenson said. “Even though the kids heard many of the same books, they all hear it differently and learn something unique to their lives, which means the children heard 3,800 books in a four-hour period.”
Christenson, who has six children and teaches music, attended Porterville Celebrates Reading as a young mother and kept going after that. She has served on the city’s Library and Literacy Commission as well.
“I love to read,” she said. “I know the importance of literacy and how people can educate themselves, especially if they do not have the opportunity to receive a formal education. We can better our lives through knowledge gained from books.”
In an email to the Church News, Christenson quoted Sister Mary N. Cook, then the first counselor in the Young Women general presidency, who said in April 2012 general conference, “Gaining knowledge now will pay huge dividends when you become a mother.”
Said Christenson, “Every mother wants what’s best for her children, and I want what’s best for my community, which is another reason I continue to help coordinate this event.”
Her husband, children, in-laws and extended family also help with the event, making it somewhat of a family tradition — but it is more than that, she said. The Church teaches all to follow the example of the Savior, Jesus Christ, and to serve in their homes, wards and communities.
“By serving within my community, I know that I am serving my Father in Heaven,” Christenson said. “I know that my children are learning to serve. Even if only one child discovers a love of reading and learning through this event, I am so grateful for this opportunity to spread the joys of learning and serve in my community, and my family has been blessed by it.”
