Kids Spend Day Off From School Cracking The Books At Brooklyn Public Library

NEW YORK (CBSNewYork) -- Thursday was Brooklyn-Queens Day, also known as Anniversary Day.

That means that more than a million city public school students had the day off.

As CBS2's Vanessa Murdock reported, some students spent their day off at the Brooklyn Public Library, kicking of their summer reading projects.

There was live music, face painting, and even a ventriloquist whose puppet was nearly blown away by the wind.

The Brooklyn Public Library's Kickoff to Summer Reading 2016 was jampacked with fun and a famous face -- hockey hall of famer Pat Lafontaine was the special guest reader.

The goal was to get kids in the game and psyched about reading this summer.

"I'm going to read 1,000 or a 100 books," Mariela said.

"My favorites are Judy B Jones, Amelia Bedelia, and American Girl Dolls," Sara added.

Adnech, 8, said the best place a book has ever taken her is Candyland.

"I met some friends. I got to save people from evil mice," he said.

At age 4, Eli already knows his favorite read.

"Curious George," he said, "Curious George gets lost in the air when he's flying a kite."

Some kids were less than enthused about reading, but event organizers were hoping to change their minds.

"What we worry about with summer slide is that kids will actually lose skills over the summer if they don't read," Kimberly Grad, Coordinator, School Age Services, BPL said.

Grad is in charge of the summer reading program. She said the average student can lose as much as one month of learning over the summer.

"You want to keep up the reading skills throughout the summer and that's not hard to do if you're reading something you love," she said.

The attitude seemed to be rubbing off on some kids.

"I'm going to read as many as I can," Sara said.

It's music to the library's ears.

As a reward for reading this summer students can win prizes -- anything from pencils to free rides at Luna Park to a collection of books chosen specially for them.