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I am happy to host the May Day edition of the Thrive Thursday blog hop. It's a chance for us to read about programs, thoughts and initiatives happening for our school-age audience. Enjoy!
ACTIVE PROGRAMS
Who doesn't love Geronimo Stilton - and all his friends! Lisa over at Thrive After Three blog breaks down a great four week series for us.
Carol at
Program Palooza did two Earth Day-related programs
here and
here that combine fiction, non-fiction and a re-cycled craft.
More
Earth Day friendly crafts are on tap at
Ms. Kelly at the Library's blog.
And Lisa suggests a
Lorax Book Vs. Movie program that has a nice Earth Day connection too!
Why not re-purpose a fun craft-it program for
Money Smart Week by having the kids "buy" their supplies to bring math into the STEAM picture? Amy of
Show Me Librarian shares in a guest post at
Library as Incubator blog
Disability awareness becomes part of this program from Carol at
Program Palooza.
American Girl Addy is the focus at
Ms. Kelly at the Library's program.
Unprogramming might with E
lephant and Piggie shows up at my blog Tiny Tips.
Movies...er, I mean book trailers!! Dawn over at
Story Time with and Signs and Rhymes shares how
5th graders made book trailers of her book.
Create a Picture Book workshop series...seriously!
Story Time with and Signs and Rhymes Dawn takes readers on a step by step process on creating a workshop where kids learn the ins and outs of authorship!
With summer coming up, this
ALSC webinar inspired wiki space on STEM programs will inspire you.
STEALTH/PASSIVE PROGRAMSNeed some
passive programs for spring break? Sara at
Bryce Don't Play to the rescue!
Angie at
Fat Girl Reading has two more
spring break stealth programs that are a cinch to set up.
Need a
poetry passive program/display? Mel at Mel's Desk shares her colleague Julie's great work!
Less Screen Time Week is how Wisconsin librarian Sue Abrahamson is rethinking Screen Free Week, May 5-9, as guest poster on
Tiny Tips for Library Fun.
PROGRAM THOUGHTSOver at
Kids Library Program Mojo, a blog for librarians taking a youth services programming CE course: Michelle shared thoughts about the
pressures on parents and program attendance; and Erin reflects on how we can
meet parents where they are in our programming.
Re-imagining library tours into a truly phenomenal experience takes time and effort that I reflect on here at
Tiny Tips.
And to bring us home, Sara at
Bryce Don't Play starts solving for the equation of
school family literacy outreach awesomeness using some Brewfest math.
Stay tuned for the June blog hop hosted at
Storytime ABCs. And if you'd like to host a month, contact Lisa Shaia, our intrepid founder and scheduler to throw your hat in the hosting ring:
lisamshaia (at) gmail (dot com). We also have a Pinterest board and a Facebook Group, so join in on the fun!
We have blogged about our field trip adventures before - Library Stars for 2nd graders (now in it's third year), and our two new additions: Library Sneakers for 2nd graders and 7th grade tours. These intensive field trips aim to introduce the kids to the library and its resources in a fun (but focused way) that is choreographed so expertly it looks like we are making it all up as we go. Let me talk about this from the perspective as a manager of our department.
The field trips take a ton of hidden-to-all-but-us work and preparation. We get class lists from the school, look up each and every student for fines and whether they have a card, drop off and pick up new card registrations, set a 2-month storytime hiatus to accommodate the twenty + tours, forgive all but cost-of-book fines for all children – and offer “Fresh Start” cards and forgiveness to parents of kids with COBs – create special bookmarks, write the scripts, recruit from among staff outside the department to have the 3 field trip leaders and desk coverage (and few, if any, twelve hour days or split shifts).
On the day of the field trip, each librarian guide knows her part and is committed to hitting their mark. Classes are split in three and rotated among the librarians (one does book talks, one does a YS intro tour, one does a “secret background”). If we stray off the clock, one group has to wait. Uh-uh. Not gonna happen. There is also improvisation (the group is late but has to leave at the same time; the kids can't focus so we decrease the time free-exploring the books and collections) that flows smoothly because the staff is ready.
The results are worth every bit of background prep - seeing new faces at the library, knowing kids understand just a bit more about how we work and the way accompanying parents and teachers get excited and look forward to these trips. We get an excellent rate of returns (kids who come back get book bags or a special star), the preschool parents who have to forego storytime are grudgingly understanding and staff throughout the library are super supportive.
Our first year was grant funded; our second funded by the schools and the third year our school coordinator and I had talked about the library splitting the costs. The financial pressures on the district are as keen as those we feel at the public library. It's a small thing to prioritize this support . Shall we spend, for each grade level, $500 of our programming money on busing that reaches 1200 kids or hire 3-4 performers for the same cost, far fewer in attendance and no message about libraries or what we do? Hmmm. Snap! We know the answer to THAT!
And then you get this message below (in answer to our query on what we owe for half of this year's busing) from the school coordinator and every piece of this is even more powerful:
I'm so glad everything went well and that our families are finding value in our community libraries. I know you sincerely want to help with the cost, but it is not necessary. We budgeted for the buses and all went well. The time your staff spends with our students and staff at our elementary and middle schools more than covers the 'in kind' cost of traveling to get to the libraries! Your work with Central HS is also very appreciated and we're working on the ways to get you connected at Logan High as well for next year! This is how partnerships work, in our humble opinion.
We'll budget for the trips again next year -- it is so worth it for our kids!
(and in a PS to our director, she wrote:Iknow that you are fully aware of the value of your staff, but I just want to tell you once again what a great group of professionals you have -- their commitment to our community is over and above most. If at anytime you want to highlight this partnership at one of your library board meetings -- happy to stop by and have our teachers/kids tell their stories!)
As a manager, I am intensely proud of my whole crew. I open doors and support their work, play devil's advocate to hone the process, help connect the right team member to the work or piece of the work that best fits their skills and talents. All the rest, ALL THE REST, is done by the team. To step back and see them all step up is what I am there for. And, as a manager, to read that support for their efforts from our school peers is all I need at the end of the day. Thank you Linda, Celine, Sara, Brooke and Emily (and my management colleague Jen) for what you do.
Scout troops always present an interesting challenge when they contact us for a visit. The leaders are trying to have the kids complete a communications or reading or library or "?" badge - they often seem to be unclear on what they want/need. The tours need to be scheduled in the late afternoon or evening when we tend to be either busiest or most lightly staffed. The kids are usually a little wild when they get together and the leaders a bit at a loss on how to reign in the natural exuberence of boys or girls not in school.
We have developed a tour that is fun and informative for the kids and inevitably helps them with their library visit. We usually start off gathering the kids for a very brief introduction to the library. At that time, if we can, we storytell either a funny or scary story for the kids to establish a rapport with them. It is always based on a kid's book so we can make the connection with them that the books in the library contain great stuff.
Since many of the kids on these visits have been to the library before on with their class or family, we usually next go to a "background" tour of the library. The outside bookdrop with hydraulic lift; Tech Services; our server room; back storage shelves; basement areas and elevator. While in Tech we chat a bit about the preparation that books need - cataloging into a collection; dewey numbers and barcodes.
Then we
catalog the kids! We ask them for a favorite subject or two, pick one and write a dewey number on a sticker and stick it on them. We also stick on a barcode. Then we head into the non-fiction and show the kids where we would shelve them. A wonderful result is that kids have already told us a favorite subject or interest so they head right back over to that area to find books they love and can relate to once the formal part of the tour is done.
We no longer sweat when the phone rings with a scout leader on the other end. We got the goods!
Next week marks the beginning of our field trip adventure for all second graders in our community.
The idea was hatched at a meeting between our public library youth librarians and our school district's LMC folks. Our LMC colleagues came up with the grade level suggestion and we looked into how to make it happen. We wrote and received a mini-grant from our local Community Foundation (combined with a small starter grant from our local Parents magazine
Coulee Parenting Connection) to help us fund buses for so all kids could visit the Main Library Youth Services area. The schools collaborated by providing us with class lists so we could forgive outstanding fines and send library registrations out before the tours.
When we wrote the grant, we noted that only 25% of our community's kids participate in SLP. And no wonder - as we are going through the school lists, almost half the kids don't even have cards. Those are statistics we want to turn around.
We are making this into a mega-big deal. We want to introduce the kids to the library but also encourage return visits to check out books. We are calling the kids "
Library Stars" and using that as a thematic thread. Stars are on the specially designed registration forms, bookmarks and in the room. Kids who return to the library once and check out material will receive a cool flashing star pin. After three return visits between the time of the tour (scheduled in February - May) and August, families can enter their names into a drawing to win a free night at a Marriot Hotel.
The nuts and bolts of the
field trip: we plan to welcome the kids and then divide the groups in three, with each group rotating between the three activities: a tour of the Children's area; booktalks/stories; "background" tour of Tech and Circ. And, of course, there will be free time just to explore as well.
We have created a simple database to trace return visits and see if this kind of initiaitive results in better use of our library. We think it will!
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Hi Marge, We have Brownie packs visit, and although we're a few thousand miles away, it sounds as though we have the very same visitors, timing and boisterousness! I love the idea of bar-coding cataloguing the kids!
We all share so many commonalities. That's why I love to hear from others what works - and doesn't - and am happy to share what I know!