Inspiration Sources Part 2

In our final post for this class, we share the blogs that inspired our coursework and our daily work in programming for kids. We didn't include alot of our most favorite storytime blogs because storytimes were outside the scope of our course (but we love you all).  Stop by here for Part 1.

• Abby the Librarian  
• ALSC Blog  
• Beth Reads 
• Beyond the Book Storytimes  
• Bryce Don’t Play  
• Catch the Possibilities 
• Fat Girl Reading 
• Future Librarian Superhero  
• Growing Wisconsin Readers  
• Hi Miss Julie 
• it’s a library bonanza  
• Keeping Up with Kids 
• Libraryas Incubator 
• Library Makers   
• Little elit  
• Mel’s Desk  
• Reading with Red  
• Show Me Librarian  
• So tomorrow 
• Thrive After Three 
• Tiny Tips for Library Fun 
• Unquiet Librarian  

A big thanks to all the students in our spring course for the generous sharing of ideas. Without their enthusiasm and discussion work, this blog wouldn't be here. Everyone who works with kids gets to program. And we hope that this blog has inspired some new programming thoughts for you!

Image courtesy of Pixabay

Inspiration Sources Part 1

As we wrapped up our class, everyone shared sources that they each used for programming inspiration. And now we share them with you! Next week our own blogroll of helpful programming blogs!

Personal Connections

Co-workers

Colleagues

Stopping by libraries when traveling

Patrons

Magazines

School Library Journal

The Mailbox Magazine for Teachers (Preschool and Kindergarten Editions)

Library Sparks

Books

For Laughing Out Loud (and all other books) by Rob Reid 

Raising Boy Readers by Michael Sullivan and website 

Starting With Stories: Engaging Multiple Intelligences Through Children's Books by Pamela Byrne Schiller

Storytime Magic by Kathy MacMillan

The Ooey Gooey Handbook, (and all other books) by Lisa Murphy

Librarian’s Guide to Passive Programming by Emily Wichman

Websites
Thrive Thursday

Teachingbooks.net

Ooey Gooey 

Seussville and Seuss font

Storynet

ALSC

Preschool Express

Activity Village

Jan Brett

Flannel Friday

Wiki Power
Monroe CountyLibraries Program Wiki

Facebook Groups

Storytime Underground   

After School Programs  

Image courtesy of Pixabay

Organized Inspiration

As a director of a small library, one wears many hats. Luci shares her techniques and inspirations for putting her storytimes together that keeps fun, great content and new ideas together - while still running the library!

Perhaps because I'm a former school librarian,  I repeat many of my story hour themes.  Almost every session (September December and January-May), my weekly themes include the ABCs; colors; shapes; numbers and counting; specific animals,  both domestic and wild; and the seasons. While winter is my absolute least favorite season, I spent 4 weeks this past January on winter: snowflakes, snowmen, sledding, and mittens.  My favorite story hour theme is numbers and counting, and I try to have that as a three-week-in-a-row theme. (I don't like math but I do enjoy it when my monthly budget sheet from the village office balances with my financial report!). 

Now, while I do repeat themes, I change out the book titles; craft; and sometimes, the finger plays or songs. Because I'm the director of a small library,  I have many duties. When I catalog new books, I keep an eye out for books that will be great for story hour. I have a list in my computer called "Preschool Story Hour Ideas" and add the book, its call number, and the month and year we purchased it. The list is organized by possible story hour themes. When I am putting together a new session of story hour, I start with this list. My second resource is my 3 or 4" wide 3-ring binder that has copies of every finger play and song that I have used or want to use. (I also have 1 more ring binder that include samples of activities that I have done in the past; a file folder with copies of every story hour schedule that I have put together since 1992; and a binder with ideas for future story hours).  

By now, I have chosen the books I want to read and the accompanying finger plays and/or songs, but I need a craft; project; or activity.  In the past,  I Googled "preschool dinosaur craft" or whatever.  Now, I will look at the different blogs I have been introduced to in this class. I do have a personal Pinterest account and while I don't spend lots of time on Pinterest,  I do look at the boards that are featured in the weekly emails I receive from Pinterest.  Obviously,  I have to keep my budget and staff prep time in mind as I do my planning,  but having fun is a top priority for me.  If I'm having fun and enjoying myself in story hour, chances are good that the children will, too! 

Image courtesy of Pixabay

Sharing Our Assets

Sara from MN shared a source of her inspiration and resources to think about how another framework like Asset Based Community Development can inform our programming work.

So, my background has been rooted in community involvement in non-profits, I'm excited to bring that knowledge to my youth programming too.

Last weekend I attended a mini conference on community gardening. It touched on utilizing ABCD (Asset Based Community Development) practices in building healthy relationships. This way of working fits well in a library setting as a location that is connecting it's community to resources, content, and self discovery. I think one of the simplest practices that can drive home this way of working in creating an asset map. It's a simple way to make sure that the people, organization, and programs are being fed and are receiving meaning benefits through the sharing of gifts.

You can learn more about the process in the links below, but I think it's a super tool when thinking about partnerships and relationship building, we at the library must give of our gifts and in turn we get to share the wealth of others. When working on an asset map, the arrows go back and forth in a reciprocal nature.

Asset Based Community Development workbook

Intermedia Arts

Putting on a Summer Reading Workshop

Our guest blogger today is Melendra Sanders, consultant at the NCKLS in Kansas, who coordinated her system's SLP workshop. Kansas does a great job bringing in a presenter to do all seven regional workshops (last year I was lucky enough to be the presenter. It was fun!)

I work as the Youth Services Consultant in a regional library system that is very loosely affiliated. As part of my duties, I hosted my first system-wide summer reading workshop this spring. Although I’ve done thousands of storytimes and children’s programs, this was my first for-adults-only, do-it-on-my-own event, and I had more than 40 librarians coming. To say I was nervous is a bit of an understatement.

Of course, I had help. As one of the seven regional library systems in Kansas, I didn’t select my speaker on my own. All the youth consultants work together to select an annual summer reading speaker. This year we invited Kathy Barco. Kathy is upbeat, energetic, and funny. She was flexible and easy to work with both before and during the workshop. In short, she did a fabulous job. But, I’m getting ahead of myself.

Although I didn’t select my presenter alone, all the rest of the planning fell to me. Looking at responses from past SR workshops, I coordinated with Kathy for what sorts of materials to focus on. I also created breakfast and lunch menus, table decorations, gathered supplies, arranged for an afternoon presentation, made tons of copies, and stuffed them into folders.

Unfortunately, our location is under construction at the moment, so a few days prior to the event, I notified attendees via email that they would not be able to park in our parking lot. The lot is always too small, but with 1/3 out of commission for construction vehicles it is ridiculously too small. I provided some alternate parking ideas, and my supervisor agreed to have a “shuttle” picking up librarians from one and transporting them to the library.

The day before the workshop, I set up the room with all my tabletop decorations, summer reading themed books, other displays, and craft supplies. The system always gives away decorations and prizes from CSLP, so I set all these items out as well. Finally, the other staff and I organized all the libraries’ CSLP purchases: reading records, certificates, posters, bookmarks, etc. A few weeks prior to the workshop, the whole department had helped me bag and label these materials for each library.

Kathy arrived in the afternoon before the workshop day. While she set up her space, I set up the video cameras because we’d decided to create a video of the event for any librarians who were unable to attend the workshop. As the first system to mention creating a video, I was asked to provide it to the other six regional systems, so we had two manned video cameras to get different angles. I also had a coworker in charge of taking pictures throughout.

In the morning prior to the workshop, it was all about food. For this, I had a lot of help from my fellow office workers. This was not their first SR workshop, and they have the organization of the food down to a science. While I was running back and forth finishing up final details and rearranging displays (I’d received more promotional materials in the mail), they efficiently set up breakfast.

Miraculously, everything went smoothly. We had a small glitch with the parking and shuttle service, but that was pretty much the only difficulty of the day. I was impressed with the afternoon presentation which consisted of four of our regional librarians discussing Teen Volunteer programs. Coordinating this had been one of the more difficult tasks, as each of the librarians has different communication styles and preferences. It could have been complete chaos, but worked out to be extremely professional and organized.

Here’s what I learned:

1)      All logistical emails need to be sent out at least a week in advance and should be sent multiple times.

2)      If I want the librarians to interact with new people, I need to assign mingled tables.

3)      Making a movie out of a workshop is VERY time consuming.

4)      LightWorks video editing software is a great product, but has a steep learning curve.

5)      Although librarians like yogurt, one small yogurt per person is too many.

Winter Olympics Program

Librarian-students all had a chance to create/report out a program they developed as a final project. Each considered the goals of the program, format (active, passive), how much time/money it might take and described how it was or would be done. Amanda from IN shared this idea.

The "Library Winter Olympics 2014" is active program that was part of a once a month series called "Kid Connection".  The series is held at both branches once each month.  This program is geared for school aged children, and is held at 4:00 at in the afternoon on a Thursday at one branch. We used to hold this program in the evening at 6:30, but we slowly started losing families. 

In this community, families evenings are too busy with the activities they are involved in, such as scouts, sports, dance, etc.  We changed the time to after school, but before the evening events get started.  This has appeared to be helpful for families.  At the other branch we hold it at 6:00.  This seems to work well there.  It is a very isolated community with not much to do.  The library tends to be similar to a community center.

This program usually lasts about 45 minutes.  In addition to the books I was reading, I pulled books about winter sports for them to look at and check out if they wanted to.  This program probably took a total of 20 minutes to plan.  I read a magazine article that gave me the idea for the program, so some of the activity ideas and books ideas were "borrowed" from this.  I also had a couple of book ideas in my "arsenal".  I was the only staff member working this program and I might have spent $3 on paper plate $5 on a snack and drink  We had all the other supplies on hand. 

As families began to arrive there were three activity stations set up.  There was a "snowball toss" where they were to toss cotton balls into rings set up at different distances.  There was an Olympic Ring craft where the kids made their own "Olympic Rings" out of pipe cleaners of the according colors.  Finally there was "Ice" skating races.  We used paper plates as our ice skates and kids (and adults) raced each other around our "track" by scooting on the paper plates.  This was definitely their favorite activity.  There were parents racing their kids, siblings racing each other and kids who had never met each other racing each other.  Even kids who didn't seem interested in the program were drawn to this activity!  They really enjoyed the snow ball toss too. 

After about 20-25 minutes of activity stations, we moved to the carpet to read.  I also had (non-fiction) books about winter sports such as curling, ice skating, snow boarding, down hill skiing, etc. on display.  I read "Dream Big, Little Pig" by Kristi Yamaguchi, "Ten on the Sled" by Kim Norman, and "Mice on Ice" by Rebecca Emberley.  These books were definitely geared more for the younger school aged crowd (Kindergarten and first grade with some preschool siblings thrown in), which is what I tend to get at this program.  After we were done reading, we ate our snack and talked about the different type Olympic events that we had been watching on T.V. and which were our favorites and which ones we would like to try.  This program is was a very hands on program, the kids were able to move from station to station as they would like.  

Photo courtesy of Pixabay

Wizard of Oz Cast Party

Librarian-students all had a chance to create/report out a program they developed as a final project. Each considered the goals of the program, format (active, passive), how much time/money it might take and described how it was or would be done. Amanda from WI shared this idea.

Back story

The Wizard of Oz cast party stemmed from our marketing wiz here at our library. The school district was putting on a Wizard of Oz play with all three schools, High school, middle and elementary. Almost all of our staff, has a child (or dog) in the play, and it came out at a meeting that we should do a “Cast Party” to celebrate such a wonderful thing happening in our community. What started out small, actually turned out to be an amazing event, not only for us, but for the entire community. It’s amazing how the community came together to celebrate.

This idea came about sometime in December, but we didn’t start planning anything seriously until sometime in January. We wanted to have the cast come and maybe do a small skit, and have some things to eat, and just have an overall place for the community to gather and spend time with the cast and characters.

Staff, prep and scheduling

In all honesty, it was a lot of our marketing specialist, Kelly that handled this program. She had the idea and she ran with it. We all helped in our special areas, but she was the one who made the calls, sent the emails and got everyone together. We have a very strong team, and we all work off each other. What stands out with this program, is how successful it was, and even though I am sure we won’t do another Wizard of Oz Cast Party, the concept can be used again.

Prepping overall was again, a lot of phone calls and emails. Our programming budget is slim to none, so we knew we had to ask for donations from the community. What ended up happening was we had not 1 but 4 local restaurants donated food, pizzas, breadsticks and chicken wings. Our local grocery store even donated a cake. A few of the restaurants even came up with their own specials to celebrate the performance the last weekend in March.

The one thing that we did have to do was make a backdrop from the play to have the kids pictures taken in front of with the cast members. We did this for$0.00! We made the entire thing from paper we had in our closet, streamers, chalk and paint. 

Then for crafts we had mini autograph books that we printed mini pictures of scenes from The Wizard of Oz and had the kids glue them on and then were able to get all the cast members signatures. We were able to identify each character with a sticker name tag that we made with our sticker maker. We added stickers to the tables so they could decorate with those as well. We also had left over face paint from last years summer reading program kick-off party. We then had volunteers from the schools come in and do the face-painting. 

With the background that we made, we also had a station that kids and families could have their picture taken with cast members and for a donation of $1.00 they could have them printed and picked up the following week. This not only cost us nothing, but brought in a little extra money that we gave back to the schools.

All in all, there was not too much prep involved besides picking up food and making the back drop, the event pretty much ran itself.

Day of the event

On the day of the event, some of us changed our schedule a little bit so that none of us went over hours. Thursdays we are open until 7pm, so we made it for that day so we didn’t have to stay later than normal. At 5pm, I went to our local restaurants and picked up the food they had donated and set it up in the back room. While I was doing that, the cast got dressed, and the kids and families had time to get their faces painted, and make their autograph books. When the cast members were ready, we called everyone into the gallery, and the director did a small introduction, and the cast members did a sneak peek from the play. Everyone loved it. After that, everyone came into the back room where we had tables all set-up with the food, and everyone was able to eat, mingle and have their pictures taken.

Conclusion

After all was said and done, we had an amazing event, that had a spectacular turn out, and even more, got the entire community together. The event, having had so much time and resources donated, cost us barely anything, besides a few fillers, like extra plates and napkins. It was so engaging, seeing all the kids and their families get together.