NILES — Tara Hunsberger, youth services librarian for the Niles District Library, wants children to shoot for the stars when it comes to reading books they love. So, the NDL is offering multiple reading programs for children of all ages.

Two are grounded in a theme: space.

“Kids kind of just universally love outer space,” she said. “We put the books out, and they get taken all times of the year. It’s kind of one of my go-to book displays if I can’t think of anything creative.”

Space is the theme for both the NDL’s 1,000-book challenge and its summer reading program. The goal for each is not to have children only read space books, though. It is meant to serve as a way to get children engaged in reading, Hunsberger said.

Children participating in the 1,000-book challenge each receive a sheet of 100 stars. When a child reads, or is read to, a book, the star can be colored in. Once all stars are colored, the child can turn in the sheet and receive a prize.

With every 100 books read, children get to move a paper rocket ship, each with an individual’s name on it, along the NDL’s children section windows. Each window has a different celestial body where children’s rocket ships can “land,” marking a reading milestone.

“It’s really kind of exciting to see the kids because they’re so excited about reaching that next 100, 200, 300 milestones,” Hunsberger said. “It has been such a wonderful experience for me to see kids get excited about this.”

The 1,000-book challenge started in the fall 2018 and will continue into fall 2019. One child has hit the 1,000 mark, so Hunsberger plans to extend the challenge past 1,000 books. She plans to use cutout constellations on a new set of windows to mark future milestones.

The summer-only reading program for children offers other space-themed features, too.

A display of non-fiction space books lines the children section’s far wall. Lego structures built by program participants are meant to depict a range of fictional and real moments of space exploration.

A freshly painted wall just outside the children’s section contains decals that Hunsberger distanced, approximately, to scale. Two TVs are mounted on the wall, displaying live feeds of spatial happenings that organizations like NASA run for free.

Then there is the summer reading challenge.

For every hour a child reads or is read to during the summer, that child fills out a rectangle meant to resemble a rocket smoke trail on a provided sheet of paper. A child wins a prize for every hour read, up to 10, like school supplies and sippy cups.

Every hour read after 10 hours gives a child a raffle ticket for a chance to receive a number of grand prizes. Each of these prizes, like a day pass to the Niles-Buchanan YMCA, was given by a local organization.

The summer is interspersed with numerous summer reading events. Some are continuous, like a summer lunch program. Others are meant to educate, like a program on eating in space.

Both the summer reading challenge and the 1,000-book challenge are meant to foster an interest in reading past the classroom, Hunsburger said. While a school curriculum sometimes requires students to read certain books, she wants students to choose the book they are most interested in.

“In the summer, I don’t really feel like I should tell the kids what they should read, because they hear that all year long,” she said. “I feel like they should be able to read what they want and what they’re curious about.”

Doing so, she said, is especially important because many things learned in books are not explicitly taught in school.

At other times, parents and school faculty can dissuade a child from reading a book below a certain reading level. Hunsberger thinks that could make a child disinterested in learning.

“I still love to read those little kid books,” she said. “If it wasn’t my job, I probably still would read those kinds of books. I think it’s about encouraging kids to read what they’re passionate about, what they want to read and explore new things.”

The NDL also hosts a teenager summer reading challenge. While not space-themed, it is influenced by the board game “Clue.” Like the game, students must try to solve a who-how-where mystery: Who saved the earth, how they did so and where it was accomplished. Each book read gives a teenager the chance to guess.

While Hunsberger knows the importance of reading to children as infants or toddlers, she said she kept the summer reading programs open to children of all ages for a reason.

“When you’re a baby, you can’t help what people are reading to you,” she said. “When you are kindergarten, first, second grade, and you’re getting to choose what to read, you’re kind of fostering that love of reading. That’s really the age we needed to target. If you can’t get the kids to read when they’re young, they won’t want to read when they’re older.”