Summer at Your Library runs June 1 to July 26. Free reading challenge booklets are available at any Orange County Library System location, with games, reading tips, fun facts and a way to track summer reading. Kids ages 0 to 18 can also choose a free book to keep, while supplies last, through a donation from the Friends of the Orange County Library System. Children can track their reading over 30 days to complete the challenge and enter a prize drawing. Details are at ocls.org/summer.
The system says the challenge is designed to support lifelong learning and curiosity by building a daily reading habit. For young children, it points to the five early literacy skills of reading, writing, talking, singing and playing as a way to develop language, comprehension and a love of learning. For school-aged children, it says reading a little every day boosts language and communication skills, improves focus, and increases social awareness and empathy. In adults, reading is described as helping maintain cognitive health, reduce stress, strengthen memory and support emotional well-being. The system also notes that reading is a socially taught and reinforced skill, that children who see adults enjoying reading are more likely to become readers, and that audiobooks, magazines, graphic novels, newspapers and blogs all count as reading.
The OCPS Mobile Lunch Vehicles also return for the Summer Lunch program. Children and young adults ages 18 and younger may receive a free lunch Monday through Friday, June 1 to July 24, at six Orange County Library System locations.
Press release issued by Orange County Library System:
https://ocls.org/ocls-blog/from-the-director-june-2026/
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