Summer vacation has finally begun! While keeping themselves safe and healthy by staying right home during the ongoing pandemic, citizens may also spend their time reading e-books from the Kaohsiung Public Library’s (KPL) online resource platform. Since iReading@KPL was first established two years ago, KPL has continuously purchased books with high usage percentages from 2017-2021 from the iReading website.

iReading@KPL currently sports 1626 e-books of 79 different genres, 500 more e-books than the platform had last year. Citizens may read any e-book in the collection online at any time and place by accessing the main webpage or downloading the application.

After borrowing an e-book, users can download the file onto any readable electrical device, such as computers and tablets. Citizens will be able to read the e-book offline during the loan period. That being said, they may also access the books in real-time online without any restrictions on time and place, which is more than ideal for elementary school students residing in Kaohsiung.

iReading is Taiwan's first national online reading platform designed to aid elementary school students in Kaohsiung during their self-regulated learning process. Professional experts and educators carefully selected the books stored in the website's collection, and books were categorized according to different levels of different difficulties. With the support of expert educators, the website is promoted as one of Kaohsiung's most important educational platforms.

This year, KPL has added 21 more types of genres to the collection to provide more resources for children staying at home and improving their reading abilities. A total of 364 e-books have been uploaded this June, and an additional 210 popular books have been made available for two months during the summer vacation on the iReading@KPL platform for children and parents of Kaohsiung.

This year, iReading@KPL is launching the "Seeking Good Readings," a raffle game activity meant to encourage diverse reading among children. Citizens who access the iReading@KPL platform and borrow five books will have the chance to win incredible prizes, such as sports cam Gopro Hero 10, air purifiers, and many more. Citizens have time until August 31 to fulfill the requirement mentioned above. This activity is held to familiarize the citizens with the platform and encourage children and parents to read and borrow more books from iReading@KPL. Citizens who share the books they borrow to KPL's official Facebook account or Instagram may have the opportunity to win supermarket coupons.

"When the government declared the nationwide level three epidemic alert, the number of e-book users doubled, and the number of borrowed books was also around five times higher. This is why iReading@KPL was launched during the summer vacation in July last year and consequently produced such excellent results," said Acting Director Yi-Cheng Lin of Kaohsiung Public Library.

"Our citizens borrowed more than ten thousand books in just a month, and they also checked out a total of fifty-thousand books in just one year. We hope we can provide an even richer selection of books for the children and parents of Kaohsiung, and so have provided some new popular books on the website."

The books provided in iReading@KPL have been categorized according to their levels of reading difficulty, making it easier for children of different ages to find reading materials suitable for them. Readers don't need to worry about forgetting to return the books because they will be automatically sent back to the system once the loan period is over.

Citizens may choose to browse the website or download the application, and those who lack computers or tablets may visit the Kaohsiung Main Public Library or any other branch libraries near them. KPL stores 500 laptops and tablets that citizens may borrow and use inside the library. Citizens may use tablets for up to four hours and the computers for about thirty minutes but are not allowed to request extensions.

KPL is dedicated to enriching online reading resources and is willing to consider both bestselling books and recommendations from citizens to add more books to the collection. Today, KPL's double-platform e-book resource sports a collection of 120 thousand e-books for citizens to read. Citizens only need to sign in to the website using their KPL borrower ID, and those without a borrower ID may also register. After completing the registration, they may immediately borrow an e-book from the collection. Meanwhile, citizens with invalid borrower ID may complete a digital verification online by visiting the website's "Personal Book Collection" page. There is no need to visit the library to complete the extension procedure for their borrower ID.

All citizens and readers are welcome to access and borrow books from iReading. For more detailed information, please visit the official website of Kaohsiung Public Library: https://www.ksml.edu.tw/.