Don't Discount YA Literature

One of my greatest pet peeves of all time is when an adult has read a Young Adult novel and makes a comment something to this effect:

"This book had its problems, but it was a YA book so I didn't mind."

Or alternatively:

"It's a YA book, so I expected this book to not be awesome."

I think that this attitude is a real problem.  It makes me sad that so many adults out there have lower expectations of books that are written and marketed for a teen audience than they do for book that are marketed for adults.  I can't even imagine what the cause of this prejudice might be.

Is it because at one point in the not-to-distant past a series of books about sparkly vampires (or who who knows what other topic) turned them off from the genre?  But it hardly seems fair to judge an entire body of literature based on a few bad experiences.  Do we discount novels written for adults because we once read a book that we didn't care for?  I don't think so.

Is it because people have lower expectations of teenagers, and therefore have lower expectations of books that are written and published with them in mind?  Let me answer that question with another question:  Have you spoken to a 14-year-old recently?  I have - it's my job, after all - and most teens that I've spoken to are able to define what they do and do not like about certain books.  Teens know what they want, and they know how to pick out the good books from the bad ones.  Teens, like their books, will certainly surprise you with what they are capable of doing an enjoying.  Besides, teens are very rarely the ones creating YA books; they are written and published by adults.  YA is not the market where B-list authors and publishers are banished to when they can't hack it in the adult market.  In fact, many authors will admit that they didn't quite realize that they had written a YA book until their publisher defined it as such.  These creators are incredibly talented people who work hard at their craft and who should be held to the same standards as the authors of adult materials.

Is it because when today's adults were teens, the market for YA books was vastly different than it is today?  Perhaps, but consider the realities of the changing publishing world.  Could you not find a good book to read at your library when you were a teenager?  Maybe not because when you were a teen the market for YA books was much, much smaller than it is today - perhaps even non-existent depending on your age - so it was less likely for there to be a book on the shelf that suited your particular tastes.  The market for YA books has grown vastly over the course of the past 15 years or so, and this means that the demand for quality material has also increased.  The creation of the Michael L. Printz award in 2000 also encouraged publishers to increase the quality of the YA books published, and they have certainly responded in kind.  Don't assume that because you were not happy with the available books during your teen days that today's readers will have a similar problem.

When it comes down to it, there are lots and lots of amazing books written for teens out there being published today.  Adults should take notice!  Don't feel guilty about picking up a novel with a YA sticker on it, because even though it's marketed for a younger audience it's probably awesome.

Admittedly, not every YA book is brilliant.  There are sub-par books out there.  But there are also lots of sub-par books out there written and marketed for an adult audience.  We really need to hold books written for both markets to the same standards and not make snap judgments about books written for teens because of whatever prejudices we may have.  Literature is literature no matter who the publisher's target audience might be.  Go out there and enjoy it.



I have more to say on this subject, but I think that I'll save these thoughts for another post.  Look for more soon!  In the meantime, check out this article, or this article, both of which also do a fantastic job of talking about the awesome YA lit that is out there and why adults should not automatically discount it.

See also:  DDYL, Part II: The Dos and Don'ts of Criticism
See also:  DDYL, Part III:  Books to Try

Cookies, Cocoa, and Karaoke

I mentioned in my last post that we had a bit of a Christmas party for teens at the library this week.  The event was called "Cookies, Cocoa, and Karaoke."  Needless to say, the program involved all three of those elements.

I'd had teens asking for a karaoke program for quite some time, and the Christmas season seemed like a good time for this sort of event.  There are many options out there for hosting a karaoke event.  You can rent or purchase a karaoke machine.  There are several video games that have karaoke elements, including "Karaoke Revolution" and "Karaoke Joysound."  Several elements prevented me from using either of these options, however.  Price was an issue was getting a karaoke machine since I just didn't have much money left in my programming budget.  A Wii game, such as the ones listed above, would certainly have been cheaper to purchase and easy to use since we already have a Wii here at the library.  However, I didn't think that any of these games would give us a wide enough selection of songs to choose from.  I also wanted to have Christmas songs available as options for the teens to sing and I could not find a single karaoke game that included Christmas music.

Desperate for a simple solution, I asked around on Facebook and a friend told me that she had once hosted a karaoke event using a program she had found online.  She told me that she had simply hooked her laptop up to a set of speakers and paid a small subscription fee, which gave her access to lots of songs to sing along with.  I looked into several online options like this and eventually selected a program called KaraFun to use for our event.  There is a lot to like about KaraFun and I highly recommend the program to anyone else who is planning their own karaoke event.  The software that KaraFun provides was free to download and very easy to use.  KaraFun also boasts a very large music library of over 17,000 songs, which meant that just about anything that we could think of would be available to sing - including lots of Christmas music.  There was a small subscription fee that had to be paid to allow us to access KaraFun's music library.  I paid $5.99 for a two-day pass, giving me access to the music library for more than enough time for the event.  There is also an option to pay for an ongoing monthly subscription, which would certainly be worthwhile for serious karaoke enthusiasts but was more than we needed for a one-time event.  KaraFun also has an app which can be downloaded onto Apple or Android devices.  In the end I ended up putting the app onto the library's iPad, which gave the teens the freedom to hold the iPad right in front of them to see the lyrics they needed to sing and eliminated the need to set up a more cumbersome table with the laptop.

The KaraFun program worked perfectly for our event.  The teens were pleased with the song selection, and they sang a good mix of contemporary tunes and Christmas classics.  The free software was actually very easy to use and provides users with a surprisingly large range of editing options that allows you to customize the music to your liking.  The feature that I actually enjoyed the most was the ability to adjust the volume in three different areas.  Of course the music's volume could be adjusted.  The impressive part was being able to adjust the volume of the back-up vocals (or turn them off entirely) or turn on and adjust the volume of a lead vocalist.  We ended up turning on the lead vocals but adjusting the volume to make this element fairly quiet.  This gave less-confident singers a little bit of extra guidance as they could follow the lead voice, but keeping the lead vocals quiet made the singer's voice the focal point of the performance.

In the end the equipment that I needed was fairly minimal.  I put the KaraFun app onto the iPad and hooked the iPad up to a large set of speakers.  We also had a wireless microphone hooked up to a different set of speakers, which was perhaps not an ideal sound scenario but was the best system that we could come up with given the equipment at our disposal.  At any rate, none of the teens noticed that the sound was coming from two different places so no harm done.  I had a small book cart available to be used as a stand for the iPad and where the microphone could be set between singers.  Finally, I also set up a laptop to the side of the main stage.  This allowed teen who were waiting for their turn to sing to easily browse the music library and make sure that their songs were available before stepping up to stage to sing.

Of course, there was more to this event than deciding which karaoke program we were going to use!

As the title of this program indicates, there were also cookies and cocoa to be had.  I heated up lots of water in our coffee pot and put out a tub of cocoa mix.  It was really as easy as that.  For the cookies, I actually asked my very enthusiastic Teen Advisory Group if they would be willing to help provide the cookies for this program.  I asked everyone to bring 1-2 dozen cookies to the program.  The three teens from my TAG group who were able to attend complied and there were more than enough cookies to go around.  Asking the teens to bring food is allowed by my library's policies but might not be acceptable at other libraries - be sure to check your policies before trying this.  But the fact that we were able to do this not only meant that I could save some money on snacks, but also that we got to eat some yummy homemade goodies instead of bland store-bought cookies.

The teens also spent quite a bit of time creating Christmas decorations for the party.  We hung up tons of snowflakes and made festive paper chains.  And of course, there was the awesome book tree.   Unfortunately, I neglected to take any pictures of the other decor.  Oops.

In the end I had five teens in attendance for this program.  There was much interest in the program and almost all of the handouts that I had put out were taken.  But this time of year is tricky for a lot of people as schedules fill up quickly and everyone is busy getting ready for the holidays.  I was not too surprised at this fairly low turnout, and I actually wonder if we would have had more success holding this program a week later after Christmas had ended but during the kids' break from school.  The low attendance, however, did have its perks.  We could all be very relaxed about the structure of the program.  I never had to put together a formal waiting list of singers and what songs they wanted to sing, which I may have needed to do with a large crowd.  Instead we could simply use good sense to take turns singing and we could afford to take our time between singers to find the songs we wanted.  A larger audience would certainly have been nice, but there was something to be said for the relaxed nature of a smaller program too.

Fortunately, this was also a very inexpensive program to put together, and an inexpensive program does make one feel better about low attendance.  I only spent about $13 on this program, half of that cost being the rental of the KaraFun music library and the other half being the cost of the cocoa mix.  All other supplies and equipment used were already on hand.  Even if I had needed to purchase cookies to serve for this party, the overall cost would still have been very, very low.

I would certainly plan some version of this karaoke event again for the teens again in a heartbeat.  Now that I know about the features that KaraFun offers and know how to set up the equipment it would actually be a very easy program to plan.  Perhaps we'll see a karaoke event during this year's Summer Library Program...

Neil Gaiman: Why our future depends on libraries, reading, and daydreaming

On Monday author Neil Gaiman made a speech to the Reading Agency in London.  Since then, the speech has been transcribed and shared all around the Internet.  It's actually a beautiful speech, and it explains quite well why reading, and especially why reading for pleasure, is so important for children.  The speech is a bit long, but it's definitely worth it.  Enjoy!

LEGO Librarians

Have you seen the official LEGO librarian minifigure?

Image taken from the LEGO website, link above.

It's pretty much exactly what you expect:  Female, glasses, cardigan, book in hand, and of course a cup labeled "Shhh."  But believe it or not, this is not actually what most librarians are like!  This stereotype has been around for decades, and sometimes it seems that no one except for the librarians themselves quite realizes that the profession is filled with a lot of different types of characters.

Joe Hardenbrook, a librarian at UW-Green Bay here in Wisconsin, saw this official minifigure and decided it just wasn't enough.  He created and photographed lots of other librarian personalities and then shared his creations, along with some snarky commentary, on his blog.  It's spectacular, and it seems pretty much spot-on.  I'm pretty sure that I've encountered most, if not all, of these sorts of librarians at some point.  Enjoy!

Candy Carrot Cupcakes

I'm giving full credit for these adorable little cupcakes to one of my co-workers, who has a way of always going above and beyond what we expect when it comes to the summer book clubs that she runs.

Today our youngest book club met to read and do activities that go along with Candace Fleming's marvelous book Muncha! Muncha! Muncha!  After reading and discussing the book as a group, the kids played Garden BINGO, made rabbit masks, and ate these masterful cupcakes.  Too much cute!

Want to learn how to make these tasty treats?  Check out the recipe here. 

Soil Science

Last week I was responsible for another school-age summer event.  Our topic for the week was soil, so I chose to focus our activities not only on dirt, but also on all of the good things that grow in the dirt.

Our first activity was actually a cooking project.  We made dirt cake!  I shared a recipe for this tasty treat in my last post, and while this recipe is decadent it uses more dishes and has a few more preparation steps than I wanted for this program.  Fortunately, there are many different ways to make dirt cake and I was able to track down this simplified recipe.  This version has the added bonus of being served in individual cups, so everyone could easily pick out their own servings.  Everyone took turns with the steps by adding ingredients, stirring, and crushing Oreos for the group.  Everyone spooned the pudding mixture into their own cups and topped it with the crushed Oreos and gummy worms.  We then put all of the dirt cups in the refrigerator to set while we did our other activities.  Everyone got to eat their treats at the end of the program.

Next came our biggest project of the day:  Soil Testing.  Before we got to the testing itself, I took a few minutes to talk about soil pH and the nutrients nitrogen, phosphorous, and potassium and why they are important for gardens.  I also explained that I had used a special soil testing kit to check to see if these minerals were found in potting soil that I had purchased at a garden store.  As a group we made predictions and everyone correctly guessed that the specially-formulated potting soil had a fairly low pH and had more than enough of the essential nutrients.

Then it was the kids' job to run the test themselves on a sample of soil from a co-worker's garden.  The kids divided themselves into four groups, and each group was responsible for testing a sample of soil from the garden for a different nutrient.  My co-worker had actually mentioned that her garden was not producing as well this year as it had in the past, so we expected to find that the garden was deficient in at least one resource.

To do this project, I purchased a simple soil testing kit.  We bought ours at Nasco a couple of months ago when we bought the supplies for my geode program, but these kits are readily available at a variety of other locations as well, including Amazon.  Each group was lead by a teen or adult volunteer, who helped keep everyone on task.  Each group was assigned a different test (one group tested the soil's pH, one tested for nitrogen, etc.) and a corresponding set of instructions on how to test the soil.  As a group we also made a chart that we used to compare the results of their tests with the results of my test on the potting soil.  (If anyone is curious, my co-worker's soil was severely lacking in nitrogen and potassium.)  The kids really loved this project, and I think it really helped that the experiment had actual real-life applications that they could readily understand.

My group of 2nd and 3rd graders took quite a bit longer than expected to complete both of these activities, but the group of 4th-6th graders had time for one last project.  We got some bean seeds started on damp paper towels.  I borrowed my plan for this activity from similar project I had seen on Pinterest (check it out here).  Each kid actually set up two bags (four seeds in each bag).  They were able to take one bag of seeds home to observe directly, and the second bag was left here at the library.  We taped these seeds up in one of our windows and have invited patrons to visit them daily to watch them grow.  It's kind of a nice bonus to have something here at the library that patrons can watch grow and change over the course of the next week or two.

All in all, this was a very successful program.  The kids had a great time, and they got very excited about all three of our projects.  I was very glad to have four good volunteer helpers to guide the kids directly while I floated between groups to help where needed.  I definitely couldn't have made this program the success it was without them!

Paleontology and Archaeology Program

This year's Summer Library Program is in full swing, and today I kicked things off with my first school-age program of the summer.  This week's topic was paleontology and archaeology.  Just like last year I actually did this program twice, the first time with a group of 2nd and 3rd graders, and the second time with 4th-6th graders.  Each program lasted an hour and fifteen minutes.

First we took a couple of minutes to talk about paleontology and archeology and what these words mean.  We then segued into a discussion about how exactly fossils form.  We talked about different kinds of fossils:  Molds and casts, as well as petrified bones.  We then conducted our first activity:  Making our own fossils!

I don't know about you, but I recall doing this little project when I was in the first grade.  To make this cast-type fossil, all you need is a plastic cup, a small figure (we used plastic dinosaurs, but truthfully any shape will do), clay, and plaster or paris.  Simply press the clay into the bottom of the cup.  Then press your small figure into the clay, leaving behind an imprint.  It is important that you press very firmly on your figure so that you get a nice, deep imprint.  Then carefully pull the figure out, leaving behind the "mold" part of this fossil.  Mix a small amount of plaster of paris and pour the plaster into the cup.  The plaster will fill the mold and take on the shape left behind by the figure.  Then simply allow the plaster to firm up.  When it has hardened, cut open the cup and remove your fossil.  More detailed instructions for this project can be found here.

The plaster fossils were a great project.  The kids really needed lots of reminding that they needed good, deep imprints to get good fossils.  Making the imprints was really the kids' only job - my helpers and I mixed and distributed the plaster simply to make the process easier with 20 kids in the room.  Since the plaster took time to set, we had the kids write their names on their cups and take the fossils home still inside the cup.  This had the added benefit of preventing accidental breakage.  The plaster was dry by the time this program ended, so there was no risk of plaster spilling in transport.

While the younger group did not have the time needed for this next project, our older group was able to create dinosaur skeletons out of pasta: 

I found instructions for this project here.  However, I did not use the printout included here as I did not want to cut out and assemble the skeleton templates.  I found a different picture of a dinosaur skeleton online (sorry, I don't remember which image I used exactly, so I can't cite it) and it worked just as well.  I also decided in the name of ease to use pre-cut spaghetti instead of fettuccine for the ribs.  I was worried that this project would be a bit childish for the 4th-6th graders, but they were weirdly absorbed in completing this project.

The next activity  was actually a very simple project, but arguably one of the most fun activities of the day.  We did some cave painting! 

 We have big rolls of colored paper at the library, which generally get used to cover bulletin boards.  I took a long length of brown paper, crumpled it up to give it a little visual interest and dimension, and taped it to the wall.  The kids were each given a piece of chalk and they were allowed to make "cave paintings".  It turned out really cool!  I took the finished cave paintings and hung them in other areas of the library after the program ended.

The last activity of the day was definitely the most complicated and involved, but I think it was totally worth it.  I filled a kiddy swimming pool with sand and set up an archaeology dig. 

I was inspired by the project described here and basically ran with the idea.  Instead of using clay pots (which I was unable to locate at a cheap enough price), I purchased plastic vases at the dollar store.  These were painted and then broken into pieces using a vice and a sharp cutting tool.  I buried the pieces in the sand, and basically the kids got to dig them up and reassemble the vases.  I used this activity to also talk about what methods an archaeologist might use and how they might use the information gained from the objects they find to draw conclusions.



The kids seemed to have a really good time with the activities at this program.  In a perfect world I might have done two separate programs - one on archaeology and one on paleontology - but unfortunately circumstances forced me to merge the two topics.  Despite split focus, the kids still enjoyed the activities, and I think that most of them got a feel for what it means to "dig" into the past.

Grow Your Own Geodes

Last week I geared up for this year's Summer Library Program with a teen program.  We grew our own geodes!

I had found instructions on how to do this project months ago (thank you, Pinterest) as I was brainstorming summer program ideas.  Take a look at the instructions yourself on the Steve Spengler Science website.  This is a very easy science project to do at home since the tools needed are generally easy to acquire.  In fact, most of the supplies are probably already in your kitchen cabinets!  The trick with doing this experiment at the library is that it takes time for the crystals to grow, so we actually had to structure this project as a recurring program where the teens met briefly every day over the course of three days.  Because of this scheduling issue and because I needed to know exactly how much I needed to buy in terms of supplies, I was sure to require registration for this event.  In the end I had seven teens in attendance for this program.

It seems kind of silly to describe the step-by-step instructions when they have already been written out so well (see the link above), so I won't do that here.  But I will post the video - created by and included on the Steve Spengler website - which briefly outlines all of the steps.



Here are a few tips for doing this project with a group:

• The alum powder is the only ingredient that was challenging to find in the quantities that I needed for a group this size.  You should be able to find small amounts of alum at the grocery store in the spice section (alum is commonly used in pickling), which should be fine if you are doing this project at home with one or two children.  But if you are doing multiple geodes, it makes good sense to buy the alum in bulk.  I was unable to find alum in bulk at local stores, but you can buy it online through multiple sources, including Amazon.  We ended up making a trip to Nasco, an art, science, and education supply company which has an outlet store located in Fort Atkinson, WI (as well as an online catalog).  It is possible that alum may be easier to acquire in bulk locally during the late-summer canning/pickling season.
• Blowing out the egg, as described in Steps 1 and 2, was a little bit tricky, but it was definitely a lot of fun.  Just be sure to remind the kids/teens to only breathe OUT, not IN, while their mouth is on the egg!  I saved all of the egg innards (waste not, want not), took them home, and made two quiches.
• To get the water heated to the near-boiling point required in Step 9, we used a simple coffee pot without any coffee grounds.  We have a very large percolator here at the library that we use for meetings, and it was absolutely perfect for this job.
• We ended up using 24 oz. glass jars as the containers where we mixed the solution and, ultimately, grew our geodes.  These worked fine, but I kind of wish that we had been able to get containers with wider openings to make it easier to drop the eggshells in and, later, fish them out.  Glass measuring cups would have been perfect, but I was unable to borrow enough of these containers to go around.
• The programming room where we did this project has a sink in it.  While this isn't exactly a requirement for this project, there were a few moments when I was very glad to have the sink nearby.  The teens rinsed out their eggs to better clean them after cutting them open, and we dumped much of the liquid out of the jars before fishing out the geodes with a spoon since the openings were fairly narrow.  This also made doing the dishes very easy.

If you read the comments to this experiment, you'll see that some users complained that their geodes did not grow at all.  Fortunately, we didn't have any problems at all with our geodes!  I truthfully don't know why these users had trouble with their experiments.  We followed the instructions to the letter and everything worked fine.  

And since you've all been waiting patiently, here are some pictures:

The teens had a lot of fun with this project.  I think they really enjoyed the hands-on aspect of this program. Several of the teens also came up with some creative ways to alter the experiment that might yield some interesting results.  It was really neat to watch the gears turn in their brains as they came up with these ideas! Ideas for variations included:

• Create new colors by mixing the food coloring.
• Don't add any food coloring at all.
• Add the food coloring later in the crystal-growing process.  Would the intensity of the color change?  Would the older, deeper crystals be clear, while newer crystals had color?  
• Crow crystals on surfaces other than eggshells.  What would happen if you were to treat an object with a different shape with the glue/alum as described in Steps 5 and 6?  What if you simply did this treatment to the inside of a bowl?

Most of the teens vocalized an interest in trying the experiment again, either as another library program or on their own at home.  Success!

Gendered Book Covers

Today I came across a story on The Huffington Post about a tweet that YA author Maureen Johnson made last Monday (5/6/13).  Her tweet reads as follows:

"I do wish I had a dime for every email I get that says, 'Please put a non-girly cover on your book so I can read it. - signed, A Guy'"

Johnson then went on to challenge her followers to redesign book covers as if the book had been written by an author of the opposite gender.  She's gotten TONS of great responses, and The Huffington Post included a slideshow of a few of their favorites with the article.  Take a look!

It really is incredible how gender-specific so many book covers are.  It's too bad, really, because even though a book might have excellent content that is attractive to both boys and girls, there are lots of readers out there who might get turned off of a book before they even open it because the cover does not appeal to their sensibilities.  

On a related note, this article (found on page 32 of the April 2013 issue of VOYA - link takes you to a digital copy of the April issue) also discusses the inherent gender biases that come with book.  The author of the article argues that librarians need to try not to categorize books as "boy books" and "girl books" because despite the gender of the author, the gender of the main characters, or the appearance of the cover, the content of most books will appeal equally to both boys and girls. 

Messy Mondays - Jackson Pollock

We have a new program starting up at the library called Messy Mondays.  Twice per month - on the second and fourth Mondays of the month - we will set up some art supplies and let the kids go to town with creative, mostly open-ended projects.  Our goal is not to make identical crafts, but rather to encourage creativity.  We will also use this time to break out some messier media that parents might be wary of trying out at home or might not have access to - fingerpaints, clay, stamps, etc. 

Credit for this program belongs largely to Mrs. Z, who we are lucky enough to be able to hire to run this program for us.  She plans all of the art projects and runs the program, while library staff gets the supplies, handles sign-in and attendance, publicizes the event, and creates a simple handout for parents to take home.  We also owe lots of thanks to our Friends of the Library group, who sponsors the program and pays for all of our art supplies.

We started the program up this month and have had two sessions.  So far, so good!  Today we celebrated Jackson Pollock's birthday by doing spatter painting in his honor.  Here are the supplies that we used:

We watered down some paint (you don't need much water - just a tiny bit to make the paint flow easily) and then gave the kids two options for splattering.  The kids could get paint on a brush and then tap the brush on a ruler, which would create lots of little splatters.  We also had some squeeze bottles with paint inside that could be gently squeezed, dripped, or even shaken above the paper.

We set the paintings aside to dry and encouraged families to look at books while the dried.  When they returned for their pictures, we matted the pictures on larger black paper to make a "frame."

The picture shown below is a sample created by Mrs. Z:

For anyone who wants to paint like Jackson Pollock but doesn't want to deal with the mess, there's also a great website where you can simulate the process online.  There is also an app available to download from this website for your I-Pad.



Looking for the Best of 2012?

I'm not the only one who's trying to decide what the best books published in 2012 were - lots of other names in the business are starting to produce their own lists.  If you're looking for the best in children's list be sure to peruse these websites:

Publisher's Weekly has a great list of book in lot of categories, both for adults and children.  Lots of great books to be found here, including a number of picture books that had slipped under my radar.

My children's lit blogging hero, Elizabeth Bird, recently posted her fall list of likely Newbery and Caldecott Medal contenders.  Betsy posts her picks three times each year - once in spring, once in summer, and again in fall - and it's interesting to see how her choices change as the year progresses.

On Goodreads, readers are invited to vote for their favorite books as part of the annual Goodreads Choice Awards.  Readers can vote in any of a number of categories for adults, teens, and children.  The nominated books for these awards are fascinating because they really take reader approval into account, not just the opinions of professional book critics.

Seen any other "Best of 2012" lists?  Please share your finds in the comments.  My own list of personal favorites will appear on this blog at the end of December.

Diversity in Teen Lit

Who are the heroes in Young Adult literature? I've stumbled upon two very interesting articles that really get into which teens are represented and - perhaps more importantly - which ones are not in recent YA titles.

This article, compiled by blogger Tiana Smith, talks about the physical descriptions of female protagonists in 50 of the hottest teen novels from this year. Apparently the old adage used to describe heroines in medieval fairy tales is still true as blonde = beautiful. Most characters, however, are brunettes described as "ordinary" or "almost beautiful."

This blog post by Kate Hart looks at the covers of YA books from 2011 and breaks down what is featured there. It's a pretty extensive study as she looks at race, gender, colors, and other items in great detail. Apparently publishers think that white girls in pretty dresses sell books.

This whole issue which kinds of characters are presented in teen books is worth considering. Are we doing teens a disservice by not featuring more diversity in our books? Are girls in pretty dresses affecting teen self esteem in the same way that beauty magazines can? It's food for thought.

Titanic Program

On April 15, 1912 the RMS Titanic sank to the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean. It was one of the largest disasters of its kind and the sinking still captures the hearts of people today. This year we commemorated the 100th anniversary of the disaster with a special program at the library.

My program was initially open to kids in grades 4-8. When sign-up was sluggish at first (and after we learned that the local 3rd graders had studied the Titanic in school!) we opened the program up to 3rd graders as well. In the end we had a solid turn out.

As kids arrived, we had them make name tags. I also gave each child a card with some information about a real passenger on the Titanic (information was taken from the Encyclopedia Titanica) featuring passenger names, ages, class, ticket cost, etc. I asked the kids to think critically about who their passenger was and try to guess if their passenger was likely to survive the sinking or not (children, women, and higher class were all more likely to survive than their counterparts). This activity was actually borrowed from an exhibit I saw at the Milwaukee Public Museum a few years ago, and proved to be a good way of connecting with the passengers' personal stories.

While waiting for the other kids to arrive they could explore a timeline of major Titanic events. There was also a display of books about the Titanic and its sinking available to browse.


Our first group activity was a discussion about Morse Code and other methods that the Titanic may have had at their disposal for signaling for help. We talked about CQD and SOS and how they are used as distress signals. I also showed them the Morse Code Machine on the Boy's Life website, which is a fun way of learning about Morse Code. You can take quizes here to test your knowledge of the code and type out your own messages.

Next we talked about the cold conditions on the night when the Titanic sank. We talked about how cold it was and how it was difficult to see icebergs on such a calm, clear night. We filled a kiddy pool with cold water and placed a large chunk of ice inside to act as our iceberg. (Credit for this idea goes to Abby the Librarian.) The kids were challenged to stand in the cold water and see how long they could last in the cold water. That was a lot of fun! Most kids only lasted a couple of seconds, but a few lasted a full five minutes before we had to move on to another project.

To prepare for our next activity I had looked up the dimensions of the Titanic's lifeboats and drawn an outline of one of the boats on the floor with masking tape. (Did you know that most of the lifeboats were about 30 feet long x 9 feet wide?). I asked the kids to sit inside our "lifeboat" while we talked about how and why most of the lifeboats weren't filled with as many people as they could hold. With the kids, myself, and a couple of helpers sitting in the "lifeboat" we had 19 people in total - the same number of people that were inside the first lifeboat when it was lowered. This was a great visual aid to demonstrate how the lifeboat situation really affected the fatality rate on the Titanic.

Next we played Titanic Trivia. I borrowed the idea for this game's format from this year's CSLP Teen Summer Library Program Manual (page 52) and adapted it for a Titanic theme. To set up, I had four chairs (one for each team) set up along one wall of the room with point values assigned on pieces of paper above each chair. I divided the kids up into four teams of four. I gave each team a set of cards on colored paper with the answers to all of the questions that I would ask. Each team sat on the floor with the answer cards spread out in front of them. I would ask a trivia question relating to the Titanic and each team would have to try to find the correct answer card. One person from each team would act as a runner and would run from their spot on the floor to a chair with an answer in hand. If they got the correct answer then their team would earn the number of points assigned to the chair they were sitting in. If they had the wrong answer, however, they would loose that many points - so it is more important to be right than it is to be fast! The kids had a great time and I think it was a good idea to have an activity like this with some movement involved. Another big appeal of this format is that the kids didn't necessarily already need to be Titanic experts to have fun with this game since the answers were already provided. Plus, it was a great way to review what we had learned from the previous activities and throw in a few other bits of information that didn't quite fit elsewhere in the program.

To conclude the event I passed out cards that corresponded to the passenger profiles that the kids were given early in the program. These cards described whether the passengers survived the sinking or not. The kids had fun comparing stories and discovering the fates of their passengers.

Overall, this was a very successful program and the kids and I had a great time with these hands-on activities. The program lasted about 75 minutes, and truthfully the trivia game could have been a program all on its own if expanded upon. I was also very glad to have another staff person on hand to help out - setting up or taking down activities, keeping the kids corralled, and taking pictures as needed.

Keva Planks

We have several fun programs planned for this week while the kids are off on Spring Break. One of them was a LEGO and Keva Open Play event.

Most people are familiar with LEGOs - those little bricks that can be used to build houses, vehicles, the Millennium Falcon, Hogwarts, or a variety of other original sculptures. We've known for ages that LEGOs are cool, and LEGO clubs have been hot programs at libraries for a couple of years now.

But Keva Planks are not nearly as well known. Actually, I'd never heard of them before starting this new job. But they're super cool! These simple wooden planks look a lot like the blocks used to play the game Jenga, but they are actually kind of ingenious in their construction. They're engineered to all be the exact same size and weight, which means that they will stack and balance perfectly. There's no need to sort a million tiny pieces because all of the planks are the same. And you can build anything!

Here are a couple of pictures of projects that I completed during our open play program. One of them was copied from the idea sheet that comes in the box, and he other was more or less my own design:











I have to say, building with the Keva Planks was incredibly relaxing. I found myself building repetitive geometric patterns and it proved soothing, much like a zen garden. It's so simple that anyone can do it no matter what their age or how shaky their hands are. And the planks have that great wood-smell too.

I'm a great advocate of just having fun with blocks like Keva Planks and LEGOs, but of course there are those who need to see that an activity like this is worth something "more." Fortunately, playing with blocks really is good for you! It's a great way for kids to learn skills in art, architecture, engineering, mathematics, and team building. Kids will literally build all of these skills without even trying as they construct new towers and sculptures with simple toy blocks.

Mars Workshop

Did you know that the theme for this summer's reading program is Dream Big? The theme focuses on nighttime, and many libraries are taking this theme into outer space. And did you also know that on August 6, 2012 the Mars rover Curiosity will be landing on the red planet? (Check out this website for more cool information on that.) That's pretty awesome timing, as it corresponds with the end of most libraries' summer reading programs.

In conjunction with both of these events, I spent some time this week at a very cool workshop sponsored by NASA's Lunar and Planetary Institute called Explore: Life on Mars. The workshop was designed specifically for librarians and other leaders who work with children outside of schools. They gave us a ton of interesting information about the planet Mars as well as ideas for cool hands-on programs that we could use with children.

I have to say, this was probably one of the coolest and most useful workshops I've been able to attend. We were able to teleconferece and meet in person with scientists who work in the field of astrobiology and they all gave great presentations. I got to flex my science muscles as I learned about Mars' climate (dry, dusty, windy, and cold) and discussed exactly what defines life and how we might find it on a planet like Mars. We even got to spend some time talking about the Curiosity rover and past rover missions to Mars.

Best of all were the hands-on activities. Each activity could be replicated with a group of school-age kids and helps to contribute to the scientific discussion about life on other planets. These activities included:

-Planting cactus as a way of talking about what life needs to survive.
-Making volcanoes with baking soda and vinegar, and tracking the lava flow to simulate volcanic activity on Mars.
-Allowing water to flow through a controled mixture of sand and dirt, simulating the way that water would have once flowed and left tracks on Mars.
-Designing our own Mars rovers using craft supplies, equipped specifically to look for microbal life forms on Mars.


I'm so excited to work some of these activities into our library programs! Who knew that Mars could be so interesting?

Articles Worth Reading

It's been a busy day for reading interesting articles!

This article, published by The Telegraph, discusses The Hunger Games, the subsequent rise of dystopian fiction, and its impact on teens. Very interesting read. It's worth noting that The Telegraph is a British publication and that several of the examples of other dystopian books are, in fact, British in origin.

This article from the Salon Media Group is slightly off topic for this blog, but is worth reading if you care about children and children's television. It's all about Mister Rogers and the impact he has had on generations of children though his simple, meaningful television show.

Happy reading!

Sheboygan Children's Book Festival - M.T. Anderson

This past weekend I was lucky enough to be able to attend the Sheboygan Children's Book Festival. This wonderful festival is in its second year, and I was quite happy with this year's programs. A number of authors and illustrators are invited to attend the event where they give a series of special presentations to anyone interested in hearing about these authors' books, lives, and influences. Younger children are also invited to interact with illustrators, creating world of art in studio workshops. Best of all, these wonderful authors all took the time to meet individually with those attending the festival to sign autographs.

There were a number of really wonderful moments that I was able to experience this weekend. But one of my favorite moments came from a presentation by M.T. Anderson, author of such books as Whales on Stilts, Feed, and The Astonishing Life of Octavian Nothing.

First of all, you have to understand that M.T. Anderson is really, really funny. Admittedly not all of Anderson's books are funny. But now I can see exactly where a book like Whales on Stilts gets its absurd humor. The presentation I attended was all about how Anderson once wanted to write books about exotic locations, having been influenced by such books as a child. In particular he referenced the old comic Conan the Barbarian as one of his influences.


Andersen then proceeded to describe how he had mentioned this at a previous presentation and someone in the audience had misheard him, instead hearing "Conan the Librarian." He thought that was a great image - the butt-kicking librarian. And you all know how I feel about that idea.


Love it!

Honestly, the rest of M.T. Anderson's presentation was just as awesome, with stories about his hilariously failed attempts as speaking French and eating foreign food. This failure at world travel inspired Anderson to instead write stories about exotic places in the United States. Places like Delaware. Don't think that this petite state is really exotic? Check out Anderson's Tourist's Guide to Delaware to get the real story about this exciting state. Even better, check out his book Jasper Dash and the Flame Pits of Delaware (part of the Pals in Peril series).

Top 100 Science Fiction and Fantasy

On this blog I make it a point to talk specifically about books and library issues to kids, teens, and the parents of said young people. But a friend of mine recently shared something so awesome that I have to blog about it here, even if it is slightly off-topic.

In August NPR released a list of the top 100 science fiction and fantasy titles, as voted on by the general public. How cool is that?

But it gets better. SF Signal, a blog about all things sci-fi related, decided to take NPR's list and turn it into something visual. The flowchart is also a little less daunting than a long, long list of books - it was easy and just plain fun to explore. It's also a decent way to try to decide what to read next if you're a fan of this genre.

The NPR list specifically includes only adult reading material, so you won't see Harry Potter, Narnia, or The Hunger Games anywhere on the list. But these are genres with such high appeal that I'm sure teens will be able to find something great to read off of this list.

The Economics of Using Your Library

A friend of mine recently shared this article, posted yesterday on MSN Money. Take a couple of minutes to read though it, and think of the amount of money that can save each year by taking full advantage of what the library has to offer.

Here's another great way to calculate the value of your library. The Massachusetts Library Association has created what they call a Library Calculator, now hosted by the American Library Association (ALA). Plug in how many materials you borrow, how many programs you attend, or how much time you spend on a library's computer. It will then calculate exactly how much money you save by taking advantage of free library services.

Taking advantage of your public library isn't just about finding great books. It's also about finding movies, music and magazines. It's about computer usage and attending a variety of fun and/or informative programs. It's all about public education. And it's all free to the public - why wouldn't you take advantage of your library?

We Love Picture Books

Back in October the New York Times published an article describing the recent decline of the picture book. Oh boy. This article made several good points about how parents are pushing their kids to read more challenging material. But they also make it sound like the picture book is a dying animal when, in fact, many outside the publishing world would say that the picture book is really thriving. In my library system, for example, many of the children's librarians stated that the picture book collection was the highest-circulating collection in their library. Don't even get me started on the benefits of picture books - including a wide and challenging vocabulary that greatly exceeds most early chapter books, as well as the way that picture books get readers to think critically as they examine both images and text.

But on to the good news. Yesterday the Times published something in their Opinion Pages that their editors had never seen before: A Scroll to the Editor. Sent by the teachers and students at an elementary school in California, this lovely banner declared the school's undying love for the picture book. Make sure you click on the link found on this page to read the full letter from the school's librarian, which describes how the school created their own Love a Picture Book Month.

How awesome is that?