In a recent webinar, Book Creator’s Community Manager David Hotler teamed up with Shannon McClintock Miller—Future Ready librarian, speaker, and education leader—to walk educators through a step-by-step guide for building a personalized summer learning library.
Whether you're a classroom teacher looking to wrap up the year strong or a librarian planning your next literacy initiative, this session was filled with practical tools and inspiring ideas to help students remain connected to learning all summer long.
Why Summer + Book Creator = A Win for Everyone
1. Book Creator builds future-ready skills
Shannon kicked off the conversation with a powerful reminder: the skills we nurture in our students today—creativity, collaboration, critical thinking, and digital citizenship—are foundational to their future success. Book Creator supports all of these with ease, from kindergarten to high school.
As Shannon shared, even her youngest learners are creating books that reflect their voices, ideas, and emotional intelligence. And when students know their work is being shared with readers across 37+ countries (yes, that really happened!), the motivation skyrockets.
2. Easy summer enrichment—with equity in mind
The new Bright Ideas for Summer Learning libraries are designed with access and simplicity at their core. You’ll find:
- STEM projects aligned to NGSS that use household materials
- Literacy journals tied to Epic! and Sora book collections
- Art activities full of color, creativity, and cross-curricular fun
- Monthly activity journals for students who love variety
Even better? All resources are remixable, editable, and free—even on Book Creator’s basic plan.
3. Empower families and teachers, too
From family letters to teacher guides and built-in instructional videos, the resources are packed with tools to make sure summer learning doesn’t feel like homework. Teachers can remix, delete, or personalize the content as needed—and even assign books that students can edit all summer long using safe settings and QR code logins.
☀️ How to Set Up Your Summer Library (In 20 Minutes or Less)
Here’s how David and Shannon modeled setting up a student-ready summer library:
- Browse resources – Remix STEM and literacy books into a new library
- Personalize – Combine books, delete extra pages, and add your own video instructions
- Invite students – Use QR codes or invite codes for easy access
- Assign the books – Use the “assign” feature to give each student a copy
- Lock it down – Set safety controls for image search, commenting, publishing, and translation. Watch a video tutorial.
🔒 Pro tip: Don’t forget to limit the number of editable books per student and hide books from others for privacy and focus.
📚 Ideas for Using the Summer Library
Here are just a few ways teachers and librarians can bring this summer learning toolkit to life:
🎨 Public Library Connection
Add a custom page that links to your local library’s summer reading program so families have more options at their fingertips.
🧪 STEM Challenge Pick-and-Choose
Let students select from fun, NGSS-aligned activities like water filtration or parachute drops, and respond in a combined Book Creator journal.
🧠 Back-to-School Readiness
Have incoming students complete reading or STEM activities before the new school year—giving next year’s teachers a head start on student engagement.
✨ Don’t Forget the Teachers
Book Creator has also curated a set of teacher enrichment resources perfect for summer PD. With ready-made study guides and author interviews from leading voices in education (including Shannon herself!), schools can remix these into book club reflections or jigsaw-style PD sessions.
Ready to Dive In?
Whether you assign just one book or build a whole summer library, these resources are designed to be flexible, creative, and joyful. Your students (and their families) will thank you—and you’ll be setting them up for a summer filled with curiosity and growth.
👉 Visit BookCreator.com to get started
🎨 Tag your creations with #BrightIdeas and let’s make this summer unforgettable!
With 20 years of experience in education, Katie is passionate about creating inclusive and accessible classrooms for all students. She loves exploring new places, trying different foods, and connecting with fellow educators.
Related posts
-
4 April, 2025 -
24 April, 2025 -
11 April, 2025 -
9 August, 2024 -
25 February, 2025 -
9 January, 2025 -
18 December, 2024 -
20 November, 2024