Did you know that the youth kayaking market was the fastest growing outdoor recreation activity for kids in 2002? There are more youths on America’s rivers than ever, and many of these young men and women are budding river conservationists. Many also have unique opportunities to capture their interest in the outdoors through the arts. If you know any of these budding stars of tomorrow, encourage them to enter in the River of Words Contest with copies of their artwork or poetry. The contest is open to any student between the ages of 5 and 19, and the deadline is February 15th.
Each year, the Library of Congress Center for the Book, and River of Words conducts a free international poetry and art contest for youth on the theme of watersheds. The contest is designed to help youth explore the natural and cultural history of the place they live, and to express, through poetry and art, what they discover. For more information link to http://www.riverofwords.org/contest/index.html
Winners are announced in April and the Grand Prize and International winners win an all-expense paid trip to Washington, DC to attend the award ceremony at The Library of Congress.
You can also buy a copy of River of Words: Images and Poetry in Praise of Water through the link at left. Sale of the book through a partnership with Amazon.com benefits AW. Amazon.com notes that the collection “offers a powerful selection of the finest work from the contest’s first six years. With selections by children from places as diverse as Azerbaijan and the U.S., China and Ivory Coast, as well as Thailand and the Ukraine, it is colorful and passionate evidence of fertile minds creating fertile visions of the world. From the hearts and minds of children come expressions of pure joy and exultation, as well as sorrow and longing, all inspired by water. River of Words is proof that children have the capacity to be intelligent, articulate, caring, creative, humorous, inventive and most of all, passionate. For many adults, busy in their day to day lives, how could we not feel a pang of envy for those heady times, when, as children, the natural world was what it has always been, a wonderful place full of discovery. “