Proudly, Springvale Library streamed this year’s National Simultaneous Storytime to more than 2.2 million people across Australia and the world.
Readers joined in from as far away as New Zealand, Brunei Darussalam, Cambodia, Canada, China, Denmark, France, Germany, India, Indonesia, Ireland, Italy, Lithuania, Mauritius, Papua New Guinea, Singapore, Spain, Switzerland, Thailand, United Arab Emirates, United Kingdom, United States of America, Vanuatu and Vietnam.
“We’ve taken our love of reading up a level and now we’re celebrating our libraries on a global scale,” Greater Dandenong Mayor, Councillor Jim Memeti beamed.
National Simultaneous Storytime is an annual children’s event where one picture book is chosen, read out loud and streamed so people across Australia can listen in or read along at the same time.
Australia’s highest-selling female author, Sally Rippin was MC at the May 21 event while fellow Australian Author Deborah Frenkel read her much-loved children’s book, The Truck Cat. The story’s illustrator, Danny Snell, was on also hand to do drawings with children from Athol Road Primary School and Noble Park English Language School.
“Thanks to everyone who organised this special event, tuned in and to the 180 lucky ones who were at Springvale Library to see all the action live,” Cr Memeti said.
“If you didn’t catch the live stream, be sure to jump on to our YouTube channel and listen to the story in your own time. There’s some other great content up there too.”
This year was the 25th anniversary of the popular annual event organised by the Australian Library and Information Association (ALIA).
This latest literacy achievement follows the news earlier this year that the Greater Dandenong community read the most books during the BIG Summer Read.