Conference highlight so far: hearing Rainbow Rowell speak and getting the chance to tell her that she’s the absolute best. It was even worth waking up at 6am!
Category: PLA 2014
AWE Learning Reception at the Indiana State Library #pla2014
One of the fun parts about attending national conferences is the parties. I had the exciting opportunity to have a party at my library last night. The AWE Early Learning computer folks decided to use the beautiful historic Indiana State Library to have a fun and lively reception for #pla2014 attendees. The evening included wine and champagne, fruit, and lots of sweet treats (including cream puffs with chocolate frosting. Yes. I had two.) and popular tours of our 1934 art nouveau building. Unfortunately, I was too busy hobnobbing with Sammy, my interviewing Toucan puppet, to take any pictures of the place when it was full of people, but you can still get an idea of the general grandeur. It was a great time and I was so happy to welcome PLA attendees to the Indiana State Library.
Evanced Celebration #pla2014
There was a lot going on at the Evanced party at the lovely Indianapolis ArtsGarden. Author/illustrator Kathryn Otoshi spoke beautifully about bullying and read her picture book “One.” The Young Actors Theater did a readers theater production of her book “Zero” and also performed their own piece. Demos of the Evanced beta product “Wandoo Planet” proved interesting. Kids build a virtual tree by identifying their main interests and then receive content suggestions. Evanced announced that they gave $5,000 to the Young Actors Theater. Yay!
Universally Accessible E-Content and Gadgets #pla2014
I dream of the day when every public library is my public library. -Brian Charlson This Public Library Association 2014 Conference offers a particularly impressive selection of programs about various aspects of serving traditionally underserved users. And boy–is there a lot to learn. Before this afternoon, I hadn’t heard about Refreshable Braille Displays. According to Brian Charlson, Director of Technology at the Carroll Center for the Blind, they are actually the most popular devices for K-12 students who are blind or have low vision. Refreshable Braille Displays are electronic devices that allow users to read text that is typically displayed visually on a computer monitor. The devices themselves do not have any screens, but are connected to computers by a USB cord. Showing 18 characters at a time, Refreshable Braille Displays convert visual text into tactual text and produces Braille output for the reader. A question that was asked during…
Every Child Ready to Read 2: Does It Really Work? #pla2014
How many of your administrators ask for solid data for your early literacy programs? Many supervisors need numbers for budget reasons or justification for staff members. While most youth services librarians can agree that ECRR2 has changed our programming for the better, there has been little research proving this. Luckily, this is beginning to change. How do you measure the impact early literacy programs have on children? The University of Washington Information School received an Institute for Museum and Library Services National Leadership Research Grant to measure early literacy outcomes for children from birth to entering kindergarten who attend public library storytimes. The results have been amazing! After observing more than 240 storytimes, the research has been compiled and examined. The research has proven that early literacy storytimes are making a difference. Children are responding to what the librarian is doing and responding to the content that is being provided. I…
Betwixt and Be-Tween at #pla2014
Does your library focus its attention on specific programs and readers’ advisory strategies for tweens? This afternoon’s program, presented by Abby Johnson and Renata Sancken with additional preparation by Sarah Bean Thompson and Kate Conklin, addressed these issues in a very practical and easily understandable way. Today’s panelists defined tweens as 4th-6th graders, although some schools of thought push the age range even younger. The trouble with this group is that although they are not yet teenagers, they feel that they are too old for many traditional children’s programs and wish not to be associated with younger kids. How can we best meet tweens’ needs? Try creating book lists or training other staff members in readers’ advisory for this age group. Many great middle grade novels have been published in the last year that meet this criteria, including Holly Black’s Doll Bones and Tim Federle’s Better Nate Than Ever, just…
E-Books and Apps in Storytime – #pla2014
Combine Saroj Ghoting, the wonderful early literacy expert and Cen Campbell, the fearless new media user, and you get some terrific ideas about how to use e-books and apps in storytimes. Their focus was not to argue if, when and how much when it comes to app use in storytimes, but to accept the reality–families are using and will continue to use media with kids. If we don’t wade in and position ourselves as the experts, we leave the playing field open for Disney, Nickelodeon, Fisher-Price, etc. Go to littleelit.com for app lists, discussions, training ideas, programming tips, etc. by wise librarians from all over the place.
Making a Collection Count #pla2014
I took a break from the traditional youth sessions this afternoon and took in “Making a Collection Count” from the collections track. This presentation was put on by two rock star Michigan librarians-Holly Hibner & Mary Kelly. They are also co-authors of Awfullibrarybooks.net and Making a Collection Count: A Holistic Approach to Library Collection Management. As a manager and a librarian who participates in collection development, this presentation was extremely interesting for me. The full slideshow is up on the Awful Library Books web site if you are interested. My big takeaways from this session were: Document each step of your collection workflow. Collection development isn’t just buying books. A collection development policy is important. In addition to containing general selection criteria, it is important that you include resource sharing, maintenance, and weeding. We collect data so we can evaluate our collection through statistics. Physical inventories are necessary. You don’t…