The Libruco project is a reading promotion project initiated and organized by the Swiss Institute for Children’s and Youth Media for kindergartens and primary schools. It aims to promote the pleasure of reading through the best current illustrated books and tries to familiarize children with these books. It also helps kindergartens and schools to create a space for quiet reading activates and to foster discussions about topics children discover in books.
Remarkable about this reading promotion project is how the books are presented to the children: Children discover the books in a funny, colorful caterpillar (made out of wood or textile) which comes to their kindergarten or school. The children then can read the books right there or take it home and ask family members to tell them the story. Afterwards they swap the books with another book in the caterpillar.
The Swiss Institute for Children’s and Youth Media offers kindergarten and schools several such caterpillars with different topics such as fear, emotion, family, art and other topics. Kindergartens and schools can lend these caterpillars for a period of four weeks. Each caterpillar contains around forty current children’s books and some interesting essays on the importance of reading for teachers and parents.
The project exists in all parts of Switzerland. While in the Italian-speaking part the project is known under the name “Libruco”, it is called “Bücherraupe” the German speaking part of Switzerland and “La chenille des livres” in the French speaking part of Switzerland.