Wednesday, January 30, 2008

Reviewing the Caudills and other assorted things

One of my reading resolutions for 2008 was to read and review all 20 of the 2009 Rebecca Caudill Young Readers' Book Award nominees. As I do not intend to re-read all the ones I have previously read (although I might re-read some of them), my plan is to post "mini" reviews of these books. For several years now I've written short summaries or reviews of the books I've read and my plan is to share these blurbs along with any other thoughts I now have about these books. I'll also try to include links to other, more comprehensive reviews.

And, of course, as I start reading the rest of the Caudill nominees, I'll be reviewing those. So, keep a lookout for upcoming "mini" reviews.

And since I've got you here, I'll throw in some random stuff...

I want to draw your attention to the ALSC blog, which is a blog I've only recently started following. If you're a children's librarian, I think this blog can be fantastically useful. My favorite feature is that they often post storytime books along with fingerplays, songs, and activities... a whole storytime already planned for your use! How extraordinary!

Speaking of storytime, I did drop-in storytime this morning and we threw in an impromptu activity with the alphabet song. My coworker B read A is for Salad by Mike Lester, a very cute and funny alphabet book which the older kids ate up and the younger kids ignored while they ran in circles around the story room. After the book, we sang the alphabet song (accompanied by B on the ukulele). Once we sang it through once, we sang it again slowly and told the kids to raise their hands when we got to the letter of their first name. It went pretty well and the parents really liked it. It would have been better if we could have had cut outs of the letters to hand to them as we got to their letter or signs to hold up with the letters printed on them. Maybe next time it won't be so impromptu.

This news is already all around the Kidlitosphere, but in case you haven't heard, the Class of 2k8 is having their first quarterly contest. Do be sure to check it out. I was skeptical, but then I had such a blast poking around all the authors' pages and websites that it was well worth it even if I don't win! (But I would love to win some of their awesome-sounding books, I won't lie.)

And that's all I've got for you at the moment, so you may return to your regularly scheduled programming. :)