The “elevator pitch” I often use for my job is that I act as a bridge between youth technology and the school library. I integrate myself into class projects, ensuring smoother tech components, and teach a digital skills class covering topics such as device 101, email etiquette, and responsible research. During the pandemic and remote learning years, this “bridge” work ranged from directing students to the correct Zoom link to join class, to assisting students in accessing our digital Sora collections when our physical library was not accessible. Fortunately, it seems that with each passing year, we are re-entering a more normal version of school. However, while challenges with technology have changed, they haven’t disappeared, and in many cases, educators find it more important than ever to integrate healthy and responsible technology use into our learning environments. At the start of this school year, I organized several faculty development sessions…
Personalized Self-Care for Success: A Guide to Prioritizing You
Have you ever told someone it’s not selfish to practice self-care? On the other hand, how often have you prioritized your own self-care? Be honest. Even if it’s not as often as you’d like, that’s okay. As we move into winter breaks, holiday travel, and wrapping up another year, personalized self-care is hard. I’m struggling with it, too. Let’s talk about how we can make it better.
Time to Play
The adage “play is the work of childhood,” is well known. But do my programs put that knowledge into practice? Reflecting on past events I noticed a lot of wonderful themes, crafts, STEAM learning, and skill development projects. Those won’t stop, but now when planning I also look for ways to build in games, gaming, and time to play.
What Can I do at LibLearnX 2024?
Can you believe how quickly this year has gone by? I feel like it was only last week that I was thinking about LibLearnX 2023, and here we are in December 2023 gearing up for LibLearnX 2024!
Nontraditional Times for Traditional Programs
Libraries are a melting pot, a representation of a beautifully diverse society. As we progress further into the 21st Century, this fact, this statement, is becoming more and more understood. A focus, and a very important one, has been put on equity, diversity and inclusion (EDI) in collections and spaces. However, do we take EDI components and take them into our library programs–namely the time and topic of our programs? What does this look like? Well, it means getting creative. It means thinking outside of the box. To be honest, I never really thought of programs outside of the 9 to 5 time frame until I became a working mom. I work until 6 PM most nights; it is impossible to take my daughter to what we view as a traditional storytime. I know I’m not just the only person this applies to. Many of your library patrons are in…
Dementia (and love) in recent picture books
Some of the children you work with may have grandparents or neighbors who have dementia or Alzheimer’s disease. This post is about books that talk about older people or grandparents who have dementia, and the children in their lives. We are learning so much these days about sensory play and toys, and how the senses are so important for folks with neurodiversity. Well, guess what? Dementia is another type of neurodiversity! We all have personal stories, and sometimes a blog is a place to share them. Today I will share just this: a lot of us have people in our lives who are losing words, or places, or memories. A few weeks ago, I was working a holiday at our central location. While pulling books for people that had holds, the books that were jumping out at me to look at along the way were the books about grandparents with…
The Art of Early Literacy Asides in Storytime
My library system pauses our storytimes during the month of December, so I always feel like this break is a perfect time to regroup and reevaluate storytime offerings. This reevaluation can be on the branch level: do you have the right number of storytimes for the right age group? Are they scheduled at times that work for your community?
2024 National Día Program Registry
The 2024 National Día Program Registry is now open, and ALSC invites libraries, schools, and community organizations to register their upcoming programs. By using the national registry, program planners help build a searchable database that showcases all types and sizes of programs that highlight El día de los niños/El día de los libros (Children’s Day/Book Day) and Diversity In Action. The Día Program Registry is a great way for planners to share diversity programming ideas and best practices with colleagues across the country. A searchable Día program map and data table are available for browsing. Use this form to enter your programs. Why Celebrate Día? Día is a nationally recognized initiative that emphasizes the importance of literacy for all children of all linguistic and cultural backgrounds. It is a daily commitment to linking children and their families to diverse books, languages, and cultures. Día Programming The four common goals of…