Preschool Lab: Building

We're back from storytime break and I finally got to do another Preschool Lab! This week, we talked about building and construction, exploring the concept in a brief storytime (20 minutes) and then opening up for playtime with lots of different building materials.

Books on display and our take-home craft packets

Opening Song: My Hands Say Hello

Book: Tip Tip, Dig Dig by Emma Garcia. This is a great book for audience participation. I had the kids dig, roll, lift, and push along with me as we read the text.

Song: Dump Truck. I found this song on Katie Salo's Storytime Katie blog. The kids loved it!

(Tune: Bumpin' Up and Down in my Little Red Wagon)
Bumpety-bumpety goes the dump truck!
Bumpety-bumpety goes the dump truck!
Bumpety-bumpety goes the dump truck!
Duuump out the load!

We sang it through once and then I asked what we should put in our dump truck. The kids suggested wood, sand, and concrete as we sang the song again several times.

Book: Construction Zone by Cheryl Willis Hudson and Richard Sobol. I wanted to use a book with actual pictures and this is a great one. The text is a little long for my preschool audience, so I paraphrased or just described what was happening in the pictures. As much as I could, I tried to relate the building in the book to our library building, pointing out our two floors, the fixtures in our story room, etc. Both of the books we read today have lots of great vocabulary words!

Rhyme:  Five Little Nails. I got this rhyme and prop idea from Melissa Depper at Mel's Desk, but we actually didn't use it today. I had it in my plan, but the kids were a little squirrelly after that longer book, so I decided to skip the rhyme and go right into our felt activity, which would give them a chance to get up from their seat.

Felt Board Activity: Color Machines. I passed out the machines and had each child bring their machine up to our "Construction Zone" as I called for it. (Our set of color machines includes one in each color that does not have a felt backing and has a label with the machine name on it, which makes it easier! This is a great activity for reinforcing some of the vocabulary words we'd heard in our books. Also, using activities where children approach the storyteller helps them get used to approaching adults outside their family (including, one day, their schoolteacher!).

Stations: Today we were all about building, which was lots of fun and pretty easy to put together (win-win). I had stations where the kids could build with Duplos, build with recycled materials, and play on the felt board with our color machines.

The kids had a BLAST building with all our recycled materials. For about 2 weeks before the program, I collected any clean boxes and egg cartons that our library staff was willing to bring in for me. We had cereal boxes, cake mix, crackers, paper clips, etc. I had volunteers tape up the open ends to give the boxes a little more structural integrity. 

This activity was cheap and pretty easy to put together. I especially wanted to try it to demonstrate to parents that you don't need to buy fancy toys to have fun. Probably everybody has some small cardboard boxes they can save up or solicit from friends who would otherwise be throwing them away. One of the parents commented that she had no idea how much fun small cardboard boxes could be and they will be trying this at home. Mission accomplished. :) 

ETA (3/3/14): The science comes in here as kids experiment with building with different materials. What happened when the piece they had didn't fit where they thought it would? How could they use different shapes? What happened when their buildings became top-heavy? How could they balance different "blocks" to create taller towers? How could they provide more support to create bridges and other structures? I saw kids experimenting and answering these questions for themselves as they played. 

As the kids built, I talked to them about what they were building, what pieces they needed, who lived in their castles, etc. 

We're planning to do a weekly storytime and building night this summer and we'll definitely be saving our recyclables again for this activity. 

I encouraged everyone to take a craft packet home. I had a handout with several extension ideas and a book list. In their packet, I included a half-sheet of construction paper and a bunch of shapes cut out from our paper scraps. The instructions encouraged children to build a "shape town" out of the shapes.

Reading Wildly: Realistic Fiction

This month for our Reading Wildly staff readers' advisory training, we discussed Realistic Fiction. This is a genre that some of our schools cover for book reports, and it can be one that's confusing to people (I've most often had it confused with Nonfiction by patrons). I define realistic fiction as a made up story that's based in reality; it could actually happen. No magic, no science fiction elements. Some might consider historical fiction a branch of realistic fiction, but for the purposes of our discussion, I asked my staff to stay away from historical fiction (a book set in a past historical time period or around a historical event).

We opened our discussion by talking about the article "Keeping It Real: How Realistic Does Realistic Fiction for Children Need to Be?" (link opens a PDF) by Barbara O'Connor (Language Arts, Vol. 87, No. 6, July 2010). The article discusses several elements of realistic fiction and how Barbara O'Connor deals with them as she's writing her books for young people. We talked about how fiction for young people needs to be a mirror and a window, both reflecting the life that children know and opening a window to how different lives are lived. We talked about the importance of realistic dialog and looking for dated language or dialog that doesn't seem natural. And we talked about the importance of finding the right book for the right child. Storylines in realistic fiction are as diverse as the children reading them, so it's important to find out what kind of reading experience a child is looking for.

As you can see, we had a diverse group of books to talk about this month, from funny to heart-wrenching and everywhere in between. These are the books my staff and I booktalked this month:

• The Best Christmas Pageant Ever by Barbara Robinson
• The Blossoming Universe of Violet Diamond by Brenda Woods
• Diary of a Wimpy Kid by Greg Kinney
• Fame and Glory in Feedom, Georgia by Barbara O'Connor
• Frindle by Andrew Clements
• From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler by E.L. Konigsburg
• Granny Torrelli Makes Soup by Sharon Creech
• Nicky Deuce, Welcome to the Family by Stephen Schirripa & Charles Fleming
• Runt by Nora Raleigh Baskin
• Small as an Elephant by Jennifer Richard Jacobson
• Sure Signs of Crazy by Karen Harrington

Next month, we'll be talking about books from popular series. You know the ones. The books that every kid is asking for but maybe you haven't read. Reading the books that kids are gravitating to will not only help you when performing readers' advisory, but it validates the choices kids are making. Yes, some of these popular series have more substance than others, but allowing kids a choice (and valuing their choices) is one way to help kids develop a love of reading.

What series are popular at your library? 

Getting Ready for Readalouds

Michelle Obama reads to children! Photo by Official U.S. Navy Imagery

As I was getting ready to go to this week's Afterschool visit, I started thinking about the things I do to get ready for storytime. My baby storytimes and preschool storytimes are almost always planned out weeks (or farther) in advance, while I pull my Afterschool books a bit more on the fly. Whether I'm planning in advance or day-of, there are some things I always do to get ready (and really regret when I skip!).

First, I read through all the books I'm planning to read, the scripts of any felt stories, and the text of any rhymes or songs. This may sound basic, but I make sure to read all the way through every book so that there are no surprise endings. My children's services professor in library school told a horror story of picking a dog book on the fly and realizing as she's in the middle of reading it to a group that the dog is not going to make it... Don't let that happen to you! This is also a great chance to make sure that you have all the props you need and put felt pieces in order for easy retrieval.

Especially for new-to-me readalouds, I will often read the book out loud before my program. If there are people in the office, I may make them listen. If I'm prepping at home, I will read to my cat (he is scared of my "wolf voice"). Reading the book out loud helps me catch any bits where the phrasing or emphasis matters. Reading the book out loud all the way through helps me remember where the story arc is going, which may call for a certain reading style. It also helps me determine whether I'll use voices and if I have voices in mind, it helps me solidify them. Of course, sometimes the voice that comes out when I read to a group is slightly different than what I've practiced (which is fine!).

A note on voices: if it works for you, do it. If it doesn't, don't. There are all kinds of ways to read a story and there's no reason to stress yourself out trying to force yourself into a style that's not you. Reading aloud, whether using voices or not, is great for modeling to parents. Both librarians and parents should read in a style they're comfortable with. But also, if you are interested in incorporating character voices, one great way to find inspiration is by listening to audio recordings of the stories. It's not cheating to copy the inflections of the actors or authors reading them!

When you're reading a book out loud before your program, you may discover words that you're not sure how to pronounce. This gives you the chance to look them up and practice before you perform. This is also a great opportunity to make sure you know what tricky words mean so that you can define them for your audience. Don't skip harder words! Defining them for your audience is a great way to increase their vocabulary (and maybe yours, parents', and teachers', as well!).

Putting together all my storytime elements before I perform it (even if it's only an hour before) allows me to figure out what my transitions between books will be or if there is any information I need to share with my kids before reading a book. I'll make an example of the book Carnivores by Aaron Reynolds, illustrated by Dan Santat (Chronicle Books, 2013). I love this book and couldn't wait to share it with my Afterschool group, but it flopped a little bit because I hadn't taken the time to read it out loud before I went. I also discovered that many of the kids in my first group had no idea what a carnivore is, which is necessary to understanding the story. Lesson learned!

What are some ways you prep for storytime?

Saturday Blues at the ALSC Blog

You can find me over at the ALSC Blog today, talking about #SaturdayLibrarian shifts and how I've learned to (kind-of) embrace them.

Simple Solutions: Building Squares

This fall, I came across a wonderful series called 25 Days of Art on the blog In the Children's Room. In particular, the post on Building Squares caught my eye. AHA! Cheap, easy, and creative is just what I need our Afterschool crafts to be and this fit the bill perfectly.

Building Squares are small squares of cardboard with varying numbers of slits cut in the sides. Kids can fit them together at the slits. We planned way ahead, knowing that we wanted the prep work to mostly be done by volunteers. (Upside: this gave us several months of volunteer tasks! Yay!)

We needed around 300 sets to take with us on our Afterschool outreach because we wanted each child to be able to keep their set. Cardboard is an abundant commodity here and it really cost us nothing but time and effort (which was mostly volunteered). We bundled them up in sets of 15, held together with a rubber band for distribution. Yes, that was a lot of pieces. Yes, we started cutting months ago. But, of course, you don't need to let your kids keep their sets if you're limited in time or resources.

The kids have loved having these sets and they were really excited to have something to take home with them. We pointed out to them that if they want to extend their sets, they can easily create more (save the box next time you order pizza, save your cereal boxes, etc.). If they wanted to color them when they got home, they totally could.

Building with the squares is a great STEM activity. Encourage kids to design a structure that will stand on the table. See how high they can build it with a limited number of pieces. Can they redesign it to make it higher? How sturdy is their structure? Can they knock it down with their breath? How could they make it sturdier? Encourage them to experiment with their designs and see what happens. For a family program, provide hundreds of squares and ask everyone to work together to build a GIANT tower!

Since they are very cheap and easy to make, building squares would be a great science component to leave out in your children's area. It's easy to replace any pieces that get torn or walk away. And it's great for families to see that you can craft and experiment with materials that do not cost a lot.

This was a cheap, easy craft that worked perfectly for a large outreach event!

Afterschool: December

I only had one Afterschool group in December because my other visit was snowed out. Here's what we read:

Snowmen at Night by Caralyn Buehner, illustrated by Mark Buehner (Dial, 2002). This rhyming story about what snowmen do at night works with a wide range of ages. Those crazy snowmen get up to all kinds of things once people go to sleep - snowman races, sledding, snowball fights, and drinking ice-cold cocoa, of course. This was a fun one since we recently had some snow (fairly rare for us in Southern Indiana), so many of the kids had build snowmen or gone sledding or something.

It's a Tiger! by David LaRochelle, illustrated by Jeremy Tankard (Chronicle Books, 2012). This one's all in the way you read it, I think. I told the kids we're going on an adventure together and whenever that tiger comes up, I scream my head off. This was a fun, funny one and I love the colorful illustrations.

I'm a Frog! by Mo Willems (Disney-Hyperion, 2013). By popular demand! We have made little Elephant and Piggie fanatics of all our Afterschool kids, I think. These books just lend themselves to reading aloud. This new E&P stars Piggie pretending she's a frog and Gerald trying to figure out why Piggie is suddenly a frog (she looks like a pig...). Another rollicking good time.

I Want My Hat Back by Jon Klassen (Candlewick, 2011). I had read Klassen's This is Not My Hat with them last year, but realized that I hadn't brought this first book! They really enjoyed this funny story. Illustrations are very important to getting the jokes, so make sure everyone can see!

This month's craft was snowman scratch-art ordered from Oriental Trading. The kids looooove scratch art and would happily do it every single time. I had a ton of kids wanting to do this craft. I always debate with myself over whether we should be switching it up every month (like we're doing now) or just give in and order scratch art every month. I guess my fear would be that if we have budget cuts, we may not be able to order scratch art at some point, so I don't want them to be counting on it. But maybe that's just not a good way to think about it!

Reflections from ALA Midwinter

Maybe it's because I'm serving on an awards committee this year, but I feel like I've finally figured out the ALA Conference this time around. I learned so much, connected with my colleagues, and had no session regrets.

Of course, I'm lucky to have been selected for the Bill Morris Seminar on Book Evaluation Training, which was a completely amazing day. We split up the day between guest speakers and small group discussions on preselected books. Topics included how to evaluate books, how to discuss books in a group, and what the experience of serving on an ALA awards committee is like. In our small group discussions, we were able to practice what we learned as we discussed the books we had read. I came away feeling much more confident about evaluating and discussing books.

On Saturday, I met my 2015 Newbery Committee for the first time (a few of us had met previously, but this was the first time the entire group got together). At our open meeting, we got to know each other a little, went over the criteria and process for the Newbery committee work, and had an opportunity to discuss any concerns or questions we might have. I know we have a lot of work ahead of us, but it's going to be such worthwhile work and I'm really excited.

On Sunday, I attended my very first Guerrilla Storytime, which was an amazing grassroots training and sharing opportunity. Watch out, ILF Conference! Soon there will be Guerrilla Storytime at you! I also attended the Preschool Services Group Discussion, where we talked about the importance of play and how to incorporate play into our programs and our libraries.

Monday was the Youth Media Awards announcements, which were very emotional for me at this juncture (my friends kept leaning over and saying "Next year, that will be you!"). I loved finding out which books the committees chose to honor this year, and I especially found it interesting the wide range of ages this year's Newbery and Printz Awards covered.

Monday afternoon, I sat in on one of the Notable Children's Books discussions, which was illuminating and interesting. This is definitely a session I would recommend sitting in on (their meetings are open) if you're interested in book evaluation and/or serving on an awards committee. Again, I was able to see some of the elements of book discussion put into practice while watching the committee go through their process to select the year's notable books.

And Monday night, I attended the joint ALSC/YALSA reception, which is a great opportunity to connect with colleagues and get to know new people. I have been to enough conferences and involved in enough ALA activities now that I know people at these events and it's always fun to see everyone. I've learned, too, that everyone gets really excited when you tell them you're on the Newbery Committee and it's a great conversation starter.

My only regret is that I did not have a chance to sit in on the Notable Children's Recordings session, but there's always next time!

All in all, it was a GREAT conference and I'd like to thank the ALA staff and volunteers for a great learning opportunity. I'd also like the thank all the ALA awards committees for their hard work this year in selecting the year's most distinguished books for children and teens. It is NOT easy work and so much thought goes into every choice.

Although I am super exhausted (I'm writing this at the Philadelphia Airport), I'm also refreshed, in a way. I'm excited to bring some of the things I learned back to my staff. I'm excited to put the things I learned into practice. And I'm excited to start my Newbery year.

It's going to be an amazing year, folks!!

And I'm Off!

Philadelphia City Hall by angelo

I'm off today for the ALA Midwinter Meeting in Philadelphia! Make sure to tune in to the ALSC Blog over the next few days because several fabulous people are liveblogging the conference! If there is anything in particular you'd like to hear about, be sure to let us know!

You will find me at the Morris Seminar on Friday, the introductory Newbery Committee meeting on Saturday (!!), Guerrilla Storytime on Sunday, and the Youth Media Awards ceremony on Monday (watch it live!!!). And I will be around other places, too.

When I get back, it will be time to read, read, read, read, read, read... ;)

Reading Wildly: Kicking Off 2014

 

We kicked off our 2014 year of Reading Wildly with a reader's choice month, and we spent a chunk of our meeting time talking about reader's advisory and how to do a reader's advisory interview. I had a new staff member start last week, so I got him up to speed about our program and we all shared our booktalks. 

To start our conversation, everyone had read this Readers' Advisory article from the Ohio Library Council. It gives a good basic overview of what reader's advisory is, so it was perfect to use with a new staff person. Our Winter Reading Club has been going on in December and January and one of the boxes on our BINGO sheet is "A Librarian's Suggestion". As our patrons began asking for suggestions, I realized that we maybe needed a refresher on how to start a reader's advisory interview. 

My staff brought up several good points about the article: 

• We talked about being approachable and ending each RA transaction by encouraging patrons to come back and give us feedback. 
• We talked about how to start a reader's advisory interview. Although many people might be stumped when asked "What kind of book are you looking for?" we usually get results if we ask a kid to tell us about the last book he read that he really liked and why he liked it. 
• We talked about how to continue the reader's advisory interview as you walk back to the stacks (ALWAYS walk back to the stacks!) and how new information might spark new suggestions. 
• We talked about how readers might like books for different reasons and it's important to find out what a reader liked about a certain title before jumping to conclusions. 
• We talked about the language "I suggest" as opposed to the language "I recommend" and why we should suggest and not recommend (recommending implies that we endorse that particular book and puts pressure on a patron to choose the book the expert recommends). 

I also shared Becky's 10 Rules of Basic RA Service and I've tweaked our book review forms to include a place for writing down adjectives that describe the books we're reading. 

And we shared booktalks. These are the books booktalked by my staff this month: 

• Alexander Hamilton: The Outsider by Jean Fritz
• Dogs of War by Sheila Keenan and Nathan Fox
• How to Steal a Dog by Barbara O'Connor
• Mary Poppins by P.L. Travers
• P.S. Be Eleven by Rita Williams-Garcia
• A Question of Magic by E.D. Baker
• The School for Good and Evil by Soman Chainani
• Turn Left at the Cow by Lisa Bullard
• Wild Born (Spirit Animals #1) by Brandon Mull

Next month, we're talking about realistic fiction since we've had some requests for that genre lately. Realistic fiction is kind of a genre-bender and can include mysteries, funny books, sports books, and more as long as they don't include magic, fantasy elements, or science fiction. Some may consider historical fiction a part of realistic fiction, but we're doing historical fiction later this year, so I'm asking my staff to read contemporary realistic fiction. 

Our article for next month is Keeping It Real: How Realistic Does Realistic Fiction for Children Need to Be? by Barbara O'Connor (Language Arts, vol. 87, no. 6, July 2010). Barbara O'Connor discusses several different elements of realistic fiction, including dialog, characters, and family relationships. I've asked my staff to keep those elements in mind as they read. 

I definitely enjoy realistic fiction, so this will be an easy month for me. What are some of your favorite realistic fiction titles? 

Simple Solution: Hang a Desk Calendar

Last year, some of my staff and I went to a district roundtable of children's librarians held at the Madison Jefferson County Public Library in Madison, IN. I spotted a simple, hanging calendar listing all their children's events and I knew I had to have one for our library!

I purchased the Librarian's Desk Calendar from Upstart, which I like because it lists authors' birthdays and it is bright and colorful. But you could use any desk calendar for this use.

Tons of people look at this calendar every day! It's eye-catching and most people recognize the shape of a calendar. This calendar says, "HEY LOOK, WE HAVE PROGRAMS!" better than any of our flyers, which are many and can blend in together. They provide information and are great for families to take home, but they don't catch the eye like this calendar does. It is an easy way for patrons to see our monthly schedule at a glance and quickly figure out if we have programs they can attend. It's also a way for them to get an idea about how our weekly programs are scheduled.

The calendar has two holes in the top corners for hanging. Since we didn't want to put nails in our desk, we ran some wire through the holes and it hangs on a screw we put into the back part of the desk (where no one will see it).

Every season, once we have our program schedule set, I take the calendar down and hand-write our schedule in simple entries. For example, Monday, January 27 lists:

Preschool Explorers 10am

Mother Goose on the Loose 4pm

There's no room for other information (although I suppose you could add age ranges if you wanted to squeeze them in there), so I put a little note saying to ask at the desk for more information. Since the calendar is hung right on our reference desk, there is almost always a staff person right there to say, "Hey, if you have any questions about our events, I'm happy to answer them!"

This was a simple solution for us to help advertise our programs: cheap, easy to update, and visually appealing.