I have a confession to make: I get a little teary-eyed when I see a child writing (or receiving) a postcard for the first time. You can almost see the switch going off in their heads when they realize that some sort of magic is going on behind the scenes… they have so many questions! How is this postcard getting across the world? What is the stamp for? How did it land on our mailbox? And when is the next one coming?! :)
So when I saw the pictures that Arlene (aka whodalalee) submitted to our Facebook page… well, you can image the smile on my face! Arlene tells the story of how she and and her friend Evelyn (aka eskae) organized a Postcrossing event in Okanagan Regional Library, as part of the local summer reading program:
My Postcrossing friend Evelyn Skae and I were talking one day about how nice it would be to spread the word about Postcrossing. We had seen schools and teachers doing Postcrossing, so we thought it would be a great idea to see if the local library would be interested in doing something. I went to the library and they were very happy to incorporate Postcrossing into the summer reading program…so Evelyn who works at a print shop made a huge poster, and brochures for the library:
She put a post into the forums asking Postcrossing fans to send postcards to the library. I donated 60 blank postcards to the library so children could answer the postcards. The library set up a wonderful display for one month to let people know about it.
At last, the day for our Postcrossing-summer reading program project came… we arrived half an hour before and waited for the kids to come. It was so wonderful for the children to be able to pick the postcards they wanted, then write the sender a card in return. We had one sender who sent 8 postcards to the library! The children were very enthusiastic and had a wonderful time, there was even a parent who wanted to write a card too. Overall, our project was very successful and so much fun.
I also took many of my favorite postcards to show the variety of postcards we receive and the wonderful stamps on them. It is so exciting to share our passion with others!
We have a few extra postcards that were not answered, so I will be going to another library to see if they would like to continue the project!
Well done Arlene and Evelyn, what an inspiring event! :)
What about you? Have you ever introduced a child to the wonders of mail? Do share!
29 comments so far
That was so good! It's the only way to bring post to the people's routine again...
I've engaged two of my child nephews on postcrossing.
It's so great to see kids enjoy sending postcards!
I've been sending postcards to my nephew (6 1/2 y.o.) the last 3 years, and he just loves to receive mail. When there's a chance, I do ask him if he'd like to send some postcards, and the answer is always yes! :)
I like the tag "it only takes a stamp" !
Beautiful story like it very much. WELL DONE Ladies!!!!
That's great, I enjoyed reading this story very much! I've been a Postcrosser for quite a while and some time after starting myself, I opened an account for the children I taught back them. I volunteered at the secretary of a centre where children got private lessons in the subjects they had problems with in school and I taught English to some of them. Postcrossing was a great way to change a bit the usual stuff I taught them and they all liked it very much. Unfortunately, the centre has closed now so the account is inactive. It's called bzrose.
That was great encouragement effort and programme, it is educational as well, well done
wow
great thing to widen kids knowledge
some of my students became postcrossers too when they saw the cards which I got
it is nice that now that know the names of the countries about which they had never known before
kids are miracle so let's make their life more and more interesting
kewl! Hihi..
Great to see children learning about the world!
great, I love this story!
thumbs up. :)
All three if my kiddos are all about sending a getting postcards!
wonderful idea, congratulations! :)
Bravo! What a great way to get kiddos (or anyone, for that matter) back to honest to goodness reading and writing. Sending postcards is a wonderful start...nothing to plug in, either. Very sweet story.
More Postcrossers = more fun! Thank you, Ladies.
eskae and I (whodalalee) both felt it was a great pleasure to pass on some interesting information to others...especially children...we had a wonderful time! Thank You Postcrossing for featuring this for us!
great idea...
Thanks for teaching children to questions stuff.Like if I put a stamp on it what happens next?If we don't encourage children what hope do we have for the future.
Congrats!
Could we have a follow-up article next year? I'd be interested to hear how many of these lovely new young postcrossers are still active!
I did a Postcrossing session with a class of 5th graders (10-11 yrs old) at my son's school. Months in advance, I started sending fewer postcards than I was allowed. Then I requested 25 addressed all at once and chose a postcard for each. I stamped them and wrote a line on each to explain that students were writing these cards on my account. I brought the cards and profiles to the class, told them about Postcrossing, and then let each child select a person (or several) to write to, based on common interests - or just because they liked the card. The kids wrote the cards, and I mailed them. I passed on the replies to the teacher as soon as cards were registered. The students loved it! I've visited schools many times but have never seen a class so engaged and excited about a project. At least two of them joined Postcrossing that day (with their parents' permission).
I did postcrossing with my 3rd grade reading group a couple of years ago, and we posted all our received cards on a world map on a wall where students stand in line for lunch each day. Also, when the sender wrote a greeting in their native language I copied on to a strip and posted it with the translation. There was a lot of interest in those cards and that made my lunch duty with the line a lot more fun!
This past year I did postcrossing again, with a small group. Although we are in a big city, their lives are pretty much limited to their neighborhoods. The kids loved getting cards and then finding the locations on the world map in our room. At the end of the year, they drew numbers and took turns picking from our cards until they were all gone.
Since they'd enjoyed postcrossing so much, I decided we should exchange postcards over the summer. I made each student (I only had 7) a packet of 6 cards, stamped and addressed to me. I told them that I would send them a card right away, and every time they sent a card to me, I'd send a card back to them. I've already received 3 cards from my students, mostly saying how they miss school!
Hello petrini1 and freshwater,
Your stories are great!
Ralf
Impressive! Well done!
:)
SO VERY HAPPY TO SEE THIS implemented in the public library setting! As a retired librarian who began her 25 year library career in the public library and has just finished a year with Ameri-Corps' Reading Corp with elem. kids - I'm jumping up and down here for what you've done.
It would be great it Reading Corp would push this idea as well with the elementary students they assist.
Thanks for the idea!
Keep on truckin' - Good for you!
Ruth - the retired librarian
Thank you for this amazing story. It's an inspiring event, indeed. When I joined postcrossing my daughter (9 years old) wanted to become a postcrosser too. Now she sends and receives her own cards. This hobby brings so much joy and fun))
Hi this was a fantastic Idea. I get many wonderful and nice cards from all over the world. It is really a splendid hobby and I hope to get more postcards and contacts. I love writing really much. Every mail will be replied. Many thanks to all of you and sunny nice summer with reagards from Hamburg , the best city of nothern Germany.
Nala
Great idea to promote postcrossing at the local library! My daughter found postcrossing then recruited me.
Wonderful! :)
some of my cards that ive sent out, the people haven't even been online in almost a month. this affects me being able to send to people who actually would help me to send more out and get more by posting the ID that comes along. its frustrating
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