Summer Reading Storytime: The Montana Story Project for Kids
Join us for The Montana Story Project for Kids from Humanities Montana on June 17th at 10:30 am.
No matter how old you are, people love a good story. Indeed, some of our best storytellers are children. A nine or ten-year-old, before learning self-consciousness, can offer up the purest form of a narrative.
Allen will use his book Montana for Kids: The Story of Our State as a foundation for a high-altitude history of Montana, First Peoples to Lewis and Clark to gold-rush towns and cattle drives. He will then make the point that we’re all of us part of Montana’s story. Who we are and what we’re doing matter.
Allen will invite the kids to think about contributing their own tales to the ongoing story of our state. Guided by their classrooms, the children can interview parents and grandparents, aunts and uncles and caregivers, asking a set of provided questions. Where did their people come from? What did they hope for? What did they worry about? What obstacles did they overcome along the way? At the end of his presentation, Allen will offer prompts and guidelines to help the kids get started on their own storytelling journeys.
Every Wednesday during our usual Storytime hour, Unearth a Story with t-rexellent presenters, hands on activities and rawr-some books! Aimed for ages 4-12 (but all ages are welcome to attend.)
Widely published across genres and forms, Allen Morris Jones is the author of three novels, three children’s books, a highly regarded look at the ethics of hunting, an award-winning collection of poetry, and more than 100 published personal essays, profiles, short stories, and other incidental pieces. His first novel, Last Year’s River, was selected by Barnes and Noble for its Discover Great New Writers program; his second novel, A Bloom of Bones, was recognized as a Montana Book Award honor book. His recent poetry collection, Mumblecusser, was both a High Plains Book Award winner as well as a Montana Book Award honor book. His first children’s book, Montana for Kids, won a Spur Award from the Western Writers of America. With William Kittredge, he edited The Best of Montana’s Short Fiction. He has worked as a magazine editor (Big Sky Journal), as an acquisitions editor (Lyons Press / Globe Pequot Press), small press publisher (Bangtail Press), and as a Communications Director for Montana State University. A graduate of the University of Montana in Missoula and Livingston’s Park High, he currently lives in Bozeman with his wife and teenage son.
Humanities Montana serves Montana’s multicultural communities through stories and conversation. We offer experiences that nurture imagination and ideas by speaking to Montanans’ diverse history, literature, and philosophy.
