Living in Library Land at Home

I love to read with my kids.  Love it.  I believe with 100% of my heart that as a parent it is your privileged obligation to read to and with your kids.  However, because I love and appreciate other forms of media so much, too, it is sometimes hard for me to set boundaries for my kids.  I love to observe them intently watching a film or TV show, because after it we have detailed conversations about plot, character motivation, and other elements (like setting).  I also love to watch them play video games with their father.  They are gaining great hand-eye coordination AND problem-solving skills.  I mean, how could you ever play any edition of Zelda without developing problem-solving skills.

But, today I'm here to confess something.  Some days my two biggers spend too much time in front of the box instead of between the covers of a book.

I try to reassure myself.  They can't go to sleep without at least one story.  They love to re-read the same books over and over again (especially Halloween books--at all times of year), and the two biggers love to take books to their little sister, so she can open them, feel them, and use them as teething toys.  However, they usually only turn to books when I prompt them.  I feel like I'm giving too much time to the other forms of literacy media in our home, so I've started to try to balance out the time divided between media.  My partner in this?  Roald Dahl.

At the beginning of this week, I started to tell my oldest daughter about a very special book.  A VERY special book with a special girl who has powers and who LOVES to read more than anything.  My daughter's eyes grew wider and wider as I told her about this girl, named Matilda.  She wanted to jump into the book right away.  I feel like this is the perfect starting point to get my kids re-acquainted with asking for book time: the story is top notch (of course), Quentin Blake's illustrations come at least every other page to help them visualize what's going on, and Matilda's mission to bring justice to her friends and Miss Honey will include a lot of grossery and action for us to talk about.

So far #1 has enjoyed immensely and has started to ask,  "When will we be reading Matilda tonight?"  #2, who wasn't too interested at first, has started to take note and peer around the covers of the book to look at the classic Blake illustrations.  But, how did I REALLY know this ruse was working?

Yesterday, when sitting in the optometrist's waiting room, #1 and I were reading Dr. Seuss' The Sneetches.  When McBean started to take off the stars of the Star Bellies (at an exorbitant rate) after putting on stars to the No Star Bellies, #1 made an amazing connection.  She said, "McBean is like Matilda's daddy!  He's taking money from those people and being sneaky about it."

Oh, my.  I could not have been prouder in that moment.  Not proud that my plan had worked, but proud that she is starting to cultivate a love for Roald Dahl and can connect the dots between stories.  YES!

HP 4EVR

Check out our Harry Potter collection, everybody!

We have two whole shelves of HP, and for a fiction collection our size, that's pretty awesome.

So, here's the question of the day: If you check out Harry Potter in Latin, does that mean that the spells aren't italicized???  Huh?  Hmm?  Something to think about!

We have Spanish, French, German, and Latin HP editions, so come brush up on your language acquisition at the Uni High Library with your favorite wizard, Harry Potter. 

NO TIME!

I think the biggest problem I have as a [future] librarian is TIME.  There's not enough of it.  It's bad enough fighting against time with my kids, who are growing up way too fast.  Now I'm constantly reminded...EVERYDAY...of how many great books are out there and how I'll never get to read all of them. 

How do you choose the perfect book to read?  How do you choose one that will be a good use of your time and one you won't regret reading when you're done?  Adult mystery-crime author, Tana French, put it perfectly on her official website:

There's one thing that no one I know, including me, ever has enough of: time. Everyone has at least three things they should be doing with every minute, and everyone could do with about six more hours in the day. So I'm very aware that when you take a chance on one of my books, it's not just your money that you're putting on the line; it's your time, which is probably even more precious. I want to thank you, so much, for taking that chance; for your wonderful support, which never stops taking my breath away. Here's to all of you. I'll do my absolute best not to waste your time.  (www.tanafrench.com/about.html).

Today I started compiling book lists to be on display at the library.  I took a cue from local uber librarian, Kim Anderson, for this project.  She has folders in her middle school media center of different genre lists, what to read next lists, subject lists, etc.  I want to try to incorporate those here at Uni High's Library.  My first list to tackle is Asian-American YA, and let me tell you, I've already come across at least 10 new books I want to read.  Here are just two:

Keeping Corner, by Kashmira Sheth

Jet Black and the Ninja Wind, by Shogo Oketani & Leza Lowitz (translator)

LIBRARIAN PROBLEMS!!!  I don't want to do my course work!  I want to sit in the corner and read some of these books!  Right now imagine me throwing a tantrum and stomping my feet with huge tears rolling down my frustrated, red-cheeked face.  Or, imagine...GRR ARGH.

Ask and Ye Shall Receive

Here's a lesson for student advisory groups: If you ask for something or make a suggestion, there's a good chance that your librarian will in fact listen!

My supervisor has a student advisory group, and so far we are doing our best to implement what they desire.  Their requests are reasonable, well thought out, and will make their library a better place.  The first thing they wanted was a book to movie display.  I have started working on this, but with limited display areas in our library I haven't quite found a "home" for it.  My vision is for it to be a rotating display, constantly updated as the movies are released throughout the year.  More on this if I actually get it up and displaying.

The second thing they want is to know about the new books.  We try to do this with our New Books display, which is constantly updated, but the shelving unit we have is well...kind of horrible.

It's really hard to see the books through the black bars, so I decided to do another new book bulletin board.  (This is another Pinterest idea.  I've simplified it a bit, but I still think it looks good.)

The display has pictures of all of the library's newest acquistions since the school year started.  I will have to do this "new book" bulletin board throughout the year but with different themes.  I like this one: it's bold, eye-catching, has a fun border, and includes a text message and rhetorical question that will hopefully gets students' attention.

Finally, they asked for games (games, games, games, GAMES!).  No, not these games:

These games:

We tested this out for the first time today during Uni Period, and though it might not look like a lot of students attended, I thought it was great for a first go.  I love this programming idea from our student advisory board.  I want to keep the games coming.  Maybe once a month?  First Friday Game Day?  I'll work with the title.  Maybe by the end of the year we could even have this game to play:

Oh, a librarian girl from the late 80s/early 90s can dream, eh? 

Grab Your Tissue

Here's another Pinterest display enacted in the Uni High Library.  It is probably the simplest, most basic display you could ever do, and it is all about...the feelings.

It's October.  It's one of my favorite months: it gets chilly, you get to eat chili, you get your warm sweaters out, but in this area October can also include dark, dreary, rainy days...which I LOVE.  Those are perfect days to read, and they are also perfect days to wallow in the misery of tragic characters, heartache, and lost love.

My Tissue Box display was super easy to implement.  All you need are a couple of boxes of tissue and lots of sad books.  Now, working in a high school is a perfect place for this tragic display, because in high school, girls (yes, I'm stereotyping and saying "girls") love to feel all the feelings: we love to cry, disparage, and wallow in misery.  I did a poll on Facebook to see what books had made my friends cry throughout their lives, and the responses ranged from picture books to Nicholas Sparks romance to war novels.  I tried to get as many of their suggestions up as I could, but many were already checked out or not available to us.  (And, I do love that a lot of them were checked out!  That's a good problem to have!)

I do wish we would have some picture books on this display, because Shel Silverstein's The Giving Tree and Robert Munsch's Love You Forever make me cry harder than almost anything.  I think it's good for students to re-visit their favorite books from their youth, too, so maybe when/if I get a job in a middle or high school I'll try to use some part of my budget for picture books.  I am also a firm believer in picture books being for EVERYONE.

If you need a quick display to do during a dark, dreary time, try this one.  It's also great, AND EASY, for an ELA classroom.  Let me know how it goes if you try it out!  (And, tell me what books you added to your display!)

Oh, Canada!

Happy October, everybody!  It's been a great start to the school year here in the Uni High Library, and today I got to put up another awesome display to try to keep our readers reading.

You might not know this, but the second Monday in October is Canada's Thanksgiving.  What better way to celebrate the awesome Canadians that have shaped pop and literary landscapes than to devote a book display to them???

To say I had fun doing this is, well, an understatement.  Here's the method to my madness...

I searched various online sites for Canadian authors.  Goodreads' Listopia is always a good place to start, and I also did a basic Google search.  I also found a great site which listed a lot of famous Canadians, aptly entitled Famous Canadians.  From there I started to make scratch notes in my Thinkin' Notebook.  (Yes, that's what it's called.)

Now the real fun started.  I created a powerpoint to be my visuals for the display.  The powerpoint is all about the things we wouldn't have without Canadians.  My favorite is, "Without Canadians We Wouldn't Have...Hey, Girl! Memes."  Oh, Ryan Gosling.  Thank you for being Canadian.

The display is made of books we have in our collection, and this time I got to integrate a non-fiction source (even though I know no one will check it out, it makes the display well-rounded) and a few graphic novels.  (I had no idea the guy that wrote Scott Pilgrim or the guy that wrote Shoeless Joe is Canadian.  Thanks, Google search!)  I was sad we didn't have any Michael Ondaatje in our collection, because The English Patient is one of my favorite books, but I did learn about some new authors (the aforementioned Bryan Lee O'Malley and the crew behind Kill Shakespeare), so that makes this display very satisfying and worthwhile. 

One last observation: Canadian authors like to use their initials--L.M. Montgomery, E.K. Johnston, W.P. Kinsella.  Just a Canadian thing I guess.

Banned Books Bulletin Board

Gosh almighty, I LOVED doing this bulletin board.  It took a lot of work cutting out all of those flames, but it was worth it.  I don't have much to say about the board, because I think its awesomeness speaks for itself.

This is another Pinterest idea.  I know, I know: no originality on my part.  Well, I'm gettin' into the groove of this library thing, and if the boards look this cool, why re-invent the wheel?  The board I looked at on Pinterest didn't have quotes, though.  I found the quotes about censorship on BuzzFeed of all places and thought they would fit perfectly with the week.  The book covers are from the authors quoted on the board.

I've loved creating a display and bulletin board for my first Banned Books Week as a librarian.  (OK, I know I'm still in grad school, and a semester and a half away from graduation, but I think I can use the title already.)  I have already started to collect ideas for future Banned Books Weeks...on Pinterest.  ;)