CELEBS PROMOTE READING.

Byline: Amy Raisin Staff Writer

NEWHALL - What better way to promote reading to hundreds of grade-schoolers than rounding up celebrities - a heartthrob radio host, TV news anchormen, McGruff the Crime Dog - to sit inches from the students in their own classrooms, reading a book out loud?

Valley View Elementary was jazzed Wednesday for Celebrity Reading, which drew about 20 adults bearing books and a message of the invaluable gift of reading. The guests introduced themselves at a morning assembly before scattering to various classrooms to read to the children.

``I think we liked the book he read, but it was also, like, he's Ryan Seacrest,'' said Tyler Woodard, 11, who waited with the others for an autograph after Seacrest, a radio personality at the pop music station Star 98.7 (KYSR-FM), read the class a book about a circus moose.

The excitement of the day wasn't wasted on Tyler's sixth-grade teacher, either.

``They were just elated. So was I,'' said Connie Froeberg. ``We had this special DJ come and read to us, with a great personality. He was just great with the kids.''

But Seacrest, along, martial arts specialist Paul Kim, TV newsman Jonathan Elias and others, came with a message, each stressing to the children that without reading, there would certainly be no use for enchanting books or even directions for the latest video games.

``This is the fifth year I've done this, and we get such a great reaction from the kids,'' said UPN (KCOP Channel 13) news anchorman Rick Chambers, who read ``Fanny's Dream'' to another class. ``You see this light in their eye, and if you connect with just one of them, it's well worth it.''

At the end of the readings, guests answered questions from pupils and explained the fundamental necessity of reading in their respective careers.

``When I was your age, I didn't love to read,'' Seacrest told the eager children in Room 505. ``I actually laugh now because I look forward to sitting down on a Saturday or Sunday to read. It's the most important aspect of my job.''

To the more than 1,000 children at Valley View, the presence of nature specialist Frank Hoffman from the Placerita Nature Center, soap opera stars Rick Herst and Brad Maule and others, it was as if time had flashed back to the 1960s, and the Beatles had arrived. Fans, and autograph hunters, abounded.

``Will you sign my shoe?'' asked one boy as dozens of children flocked around some readers after the event.

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(1 -- 2) News anchor Rick Chambers, above, reads ``Fanny's Dream'' to students at Valley View Elementary School while, down the hall, radio personality Ryan Seacrest, left, read ``Charlie Malarkey & the Singing Moose'' to sixth-graders.

John Lazar/Staff Photographer