MANCHESTER FIRST GRADER WINS SECOND PLACE IN NATIONAL PBS KIDS GO! WRITERS CONTEST

(DURHAM, July 17, 2013) — First grader and author/illustrator of “Percy Learns a Lesson,” Stephen Denio of Manchester, NH, is a 2nd place winner in the national PBS KIDS GO! Writers Contest for his story about a young pencil who overcomes his fear of being sharpened. Denio, who is home-schooled, won the first-grade category of the 2013 NHPTV-PBS KIDS GO! Writers Contest, which encourages children in grades K-3 to explore the power of creativity and reading by writing and illustrating their own stories. “Percy was a brand new blue pencil with a yellow eraser. He lived in a pencil box in a cabinet in a house. His life was awesome except for one problem…His predicament was this: Percy was terrified of being sharpened and because he wasn’t sharpened, he could not write.” So begins Denio’s story, in which his friends Christiana Crayon, Max Marker and Peter Pen help Percy Pencil overcome his fears. Read “Percy Learns a Lesson” here: http://bit.ly/12DHgnU Denio placed second for writing and illustrating a creative and original story in the national PBS KIDS GO! Writers Contest at the first-grade level. Over 60 PBS stations submitted stories for the national competition. “The NHPTV-PBS KIDS GO! Writers Contest is a huge part of our writing and education curriculum because we home school,” remarked Cindy Denio, whose other son, Caleb, placed first in the third-grade category. “The stories have been their writing unit, and this contest is always such a positive experience,” she added.Starting as the Reading Rainbow Young Writers and Illustrators Contest in 1994, the contest became the NHPTV-PBS KIDS GO! Writers Contest in 2010. In addition to Denio, six local children have been recognized for their work with national awards over the years and more than 10,000 NH students have participated in the contest. The NHPTV-PBS KIDS GO! Writers Contest aligns with New Hampshire writing and reading standards, and is made possible with support from Heinemann. All of NHPTV’s 2013 winning stories can be found at www.nhptv.org/kidswrite, the NHPTV-PBS KIDS GO! Writers Contest website.

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