Kids Library Program Mojo

Wednesday, February 18, 2015

Programming vs. Unprogramming

We discussed unprogramming in class recently. A question that came up was how unprogramming differed from regular programming and if it actually saved preparation time. In the course of our lecture and discussions, many students realized they already incorporated unprogramming into their program work!

In the program v. unprogram model, unprograms allow kids more freedom to explore and and discover independently. The "program" model is one where the staff member remains the leader and pretty much keeps the action going through their actions and ongoing presentation. Kids are the audience; the librarian is the leader. The burden of "making it happen" is on the library staffer and the timing can be a little more rigid and librarian-presented. It's more like a storytime and less like your programs.

That said, I agree with you, unprogramming "stations of stuff" can be time consuming to prep if there is alot of pre-cutting/pre-prep - or simpler to prep if kids are given alot of agency to create.

Here's a for instance of a simpler prep I've done. When we crash into a planet and the kids have to go into survival mode (we first talk about what the planet is like - hot or cold; dark or light; windy or calm; sandy or full of plants), I might have three stations - I let a few kids be "medics" to put stickers on "wounds" (at first there are only a few "injuries"; once kids see the stickers, far more wounds are found ;->. Next station is robot hands to grab a cup of legos. Third activity is kids work alone or together to build Lego shelters. Finally we re-gather and kids each talk about their shelters - that's a beautiful imaginative thing! They invent the best stuff to help them survive or live in luxury while waiting for rescue.

I like to look for ways when I do this kind of unprogramming for maximum chances for kids to create and explore so I try to keep the stations focused on giving kids a chance to experiment, build, craft or make. And with all the ideas I have pinned, it's easy to gather just the right stuff to keep planning and prep in perspective.

Sometimes people approach each and every program as an extravagant party that they are hosting. Unprogramming suggests that planning can be less if kids are allowed the time to try things and discover more at their pace.

Monday, February 16, 2015

You Say You want an Evolution

If the old adage, "If at first you don't succeed - try, try again" has any legs, than our class guest blogger, Jennifer Regan, a children's librarian in Illinois, is the perfect person to exemplify it. Here she breaks down how she solved and solved for the equation of success:

A few years ago a co-worker and I wrote a grant for Tot Spot, an early literacy program focused on parent and child play. We were very excited to receive the grant money and used it to buy books, toys, games, flannel boards and puppets centered around ten different themes. Tot Spot started out as a once a month, "open-house" style program on Saturday. We supplied parents with a checklist for each themed station and supplied other parent resources (books and handouts) on early literacy. At first, Tot Spot was hugely popular and we had many patrons coming to play with their little ones.

After about six months, the numbers dwindled and we were left wondering what had happened. We continued to set up the program--which was A LOT of work--clearing out the activity room, setting up all the stations and signage, then cleaning up and dragging the bins back to the storage closet. I finally decided to close up shop.

As a new program year started, I had the idea to give it another try and have Tot Spot open immediately following our half-hour storytime on Monday evenings--again, once a month on the last Monday of the month. This worked out OK, but it was still a crazy amount of work for the six kids who came to Storytime. Also, the kids were so excited when it was Tot Spot night, that they didn't care about the book or craft for Storytime. Some moms felt it was too late to stay after storytime to play, and inevitably we would have a meltdown from a child who wanted to stay. Again, Tot Spot got "shelved."

I felt is was a terrible waste of resources to have the wonderful Tot Spot materials packed in a closet. I found space in the Children's Department (thanks to the support of my director who agreed to move an outdated "kids" computer that rarely worked!) and our Early Literacy Tot Spot was born! I only set up two themed stations at a time and keep them up for about 4 - 6 weeks. The kids are always excited to see what the next stations will be.

The response has been terrific! We reach many more children by having the stations up all the time. We also have a rack of early literacy handouts nearby for parents to read while the kids play. It's a lot less work for us, because it's only two stations at a time and they are easy to keep tidy. Best of all, it's a program that virtually runs itself!

Friday, February 13, 2015

Re-creating a Program for Success

Image Source

It's OK. Go ahead. Admit it. We all experience a program that seems to have hit a dead end. People stop coming, staff time seems wasted and it looks like its time to say adios. Or is it?

Our student librarians discussed how they evolved programs and breathed new life into them with a few simple changes:

- For over a year, we had a weekly afterschool program for K-5th called Reading Academy. The program rotated between the librarians and we would choose a book to read and then do activities based on the book. It was a flop. The number continued to dwindle (by the end we would only have 2 kids per program) and we were never excited about it. Then, we got an amazing reference book: "After-School Clubs for Kids: Thematic Programming to Encourage Reading" by Lisa Shaia and decided to rebrand. We now have the After School Crew which has monthly themes like Monster Mash and Mad Scientist. We've found it has really revitalized us as librarians because it's a lot easier to come up with a cool activity based on the theme and then the book instead of the other way around. The patrons seem to love it too as we've had completely filled programs and the numbers have barely dwindled. My favorite thing is that on the very first program for it, I went around our room to encourage families to come and a family I had never seen before decided to attend. They have now come back every week for the last month because they like the program so much!

- We have been planning more STEM and STEAM programs. The children are very interested in science; however, we seem to have trouble filling a program at a certain time of day. Our solution has been to set up hand-on self directed tables. The families seem to really enjoy these. Many times the parent or grandparent has the opportunity to teach something new and it becomes something of a family event. Right now we have a circuit board set up and the children test different items to try and complete the circuit. This allows many more families to experience the learning than we could attract to a single program.

- I run the Mock Awards for our library system and I had heard from a few librarians they didn't feel comfortable attending. I probed them and found out they didn't like getting up in front of the group to discuss the books' merits. Since I am a very outgoing person, this never would have occurred to me as a barrier to attending!

So I took this feedback to heart and I switched up the way we shared our opinions about the Mock books this year. We had tables of 5 and each table had a set amount of time to discuss the Caldecott, Printz and Newbery. Each small group had a Table Captain and this person summarized the small groups' opinions and shared it with the larger group. A few of the small group members chimed in if the Table Captain left something important out, or they thought of something else to add.

A few people have thanked me since the Mock awards to say they really liked this format because A) they were more comfortable attending because they didn't have to get up and speak in front of a large group and B) we ended on time because the table members weren't spending time discussing who was going to stand up and talk about each nominated book!

- We changed our program to a timed reading recording for our summer reading over the previous counting number of books. Once we did this a few years ago we saw many more participating throughout the summer and completing more reading records. It gave kids a chance to spend time reading something they really wanted to- say one of the Harry Potter books and not feel they had to read a bunch of books to complete the reading record. A couple years after we switched to that, we added a super reader booklet for those who completed their reading time- a fun booklet of various types of reading. For the reward for that booklet completion we had a board game/pizza party program at the end of the summer for those kids ( and also invted our summer teen volunteers to the party).

Monday, February 9, 2015

Programming Challenges

While most of us would say programming, the most public part of our work, is also the most fun, it also comes with challenges. In preparation for problem-solving in weeks ahead in class, our participants (from libraries both big and small) discussed some of the most challenging parts of programming work. Here's what they shared.

Uncertain attendance numbers:
- My greatest frustration would be when I plan something that I think is super awesome and then only a few kids show up. While granted, those kids do have fun, it always kind of deflates you a little when you think you have this great thing planned but can't get kids to come in and join the fun. Finding the balance of making sure you're still excited about whatever you're doing while also making sure that it's something that is appealing to kids too is really hard but really important because obviously you want to like what you're doing also or the kids would be able to tell you're a little "eh" on the whole thing.

- My greatest frustration is having to limit attendance for a program, and then have people sign up and not come for the program--even after a reminder call--when there are people who really wanted to come on the waiting list. Ugh!

Great advertising/low attendance:
- Effective Marketing, you put posters up, advertise in your newspaper column, post an event on Facebook and still people say they had no idea that a program was happening.

- I totally relate to your comment about people saying they didn't know about the program after you have worked on all that pr. Sometimes I think they would like us to come right to their door and take them by the hand and lead them to the library. :)

- My biggest frustration---getting parents to bring their children to the programs! I have a wonderful relationship with our Elementary School. I'm able to send flyers home with students about our programs. So that's TONS of people who find out about programs. Then when the time comes for the program to start, I either get *crickets* or four kids. How can I get the kids TO the program? It's a constant struggle.

Being the only librarian:

- I am the youth services department all by myself. This can be incredibly frustrating. I run short of time to keep up with literature for all ages and I find I can only do so many programs in a week or month to serve all my distinct age groups. I often look at what the libraries around me are doing and I think I should be doing more - and then I realize that they have 8 Children's Librarians and one is specifically for early literacy and one is specifically for outreach... I have to remind myself that I am only one person.

Being new and following a well loved librarian:
- Attendance has always been pretty steady here, maybe not high numbers, but consistent still. However, that was with the former person. I'm very nervous that because it's someone new that parents won't respond well. Or they won't even be open minded about the new way I want to do things. I want so badly for this to be perfect and the kids to have fun, but they have to accept me before they can do that.

- The previous librarian here was very well loved and my first day was filled with everyone I came into contact with telling me that she left a huge hole to fill and that everyone loved her so much and were very sad that she left. It didn't really set me up for feeling like I can conquer these new tasks! But I spoke with a good friend of mine and she reminded me that in a short time, people might be saying the same thing about me. Change is always hard for people to handle, but eventually they fall into the new routine.

- My greatest frustration is following in the footsteps of someone who had my position for 22 years. Everyone loved her and misses her dearly. While she created a lot of great programs and workshops for our youth services librarians across 16 libraries, I feel there is some room for improvement. I think with fresh eyes, I can help improve on what has been in place for many years and maybe take things to the next level. So one of my frustrations is rocking the boat if I change anything too drastically. I have been playing it safe this last 7 months pretty much running things as is. I have been tweaking things here and there but no major changes will happen until I am at least one full year in!

Parents who are uninvolved:
- For the most part parents who bring their children to the library are terrific but then there are those that are just so disconnected from their children and what is going on. They pay no attention to our handouts, our guidelines, tell their kids we aren't going to check out now...all the kind of actions and statements that frustrate me when dealing with them.

- parents that allow children to be disruptive or destructive and putting in the time, money and effort to plan a program with little attendance.

Budgetary woes:
- The city has cut our programming budget going into the budget cycle for next year. Unfortunately, that means that starting July 1, we will no longer have any money at all for programming. That means I can't even buy glue, markers, or construction paper for story hour or other programs because that line item is gone. We are looking for grants that will help us fix this hole in our resources, but so far we haven't found much we can apply for. We can stretch what we already have for as long as possible, but it won't get us through the year. We'll need to get creative on free programming!

Challenges are always part of our work and how we work to solve them can make a big difference in our programming work. In coming weeks we'll be looking at ways to creatively approach these and other issues in our work. Stay tuned!.

Wednesday, February 4, 2015

BIG Love

Pixabay image

Our spring 2015 programming class has begun. We are already into lively discussions with the students who hail from around the country as well as from my home state of Wisconsin.

What are we talking about as we begin? BIG LOVE! Here, directly from the student/librarians are a few of the reasons that programming is just so much darn fun and so satisfying:

Kids and parents expressing appreciation for the library/ program presented. a "four-year-old girl came in with three of her friends all dressed up like princesses. She told me that she wanted to have her birthday party at the library, so they all came to make crafts for each other and their parents. It made my heart absolutely melt, and all the stress I felt the night before making sure all the supplies were prepped was totally worth it."

Kids and parents expressing appreciation for the program presented when you are a brand new librarian following in the footsteps of a well-loved librarian who is no longer there! "My greatest happiness is when I do take a leap and implement a change and people truly appreciate it."

Being a department of one, it is lightning fast and easy to make changes. " There is no committee, no extra paperwork, no delegating who is going to do what part, etc, etc. I used to work with 10 other children's librarians (big library) and all ideas had to go through an arduous review process that killed all momentum before it even started. I often wish I had a part-time assistant, but in general I am very happy making my own way. I see a great idea and I can immediately try to implement it. I love the forward direction and the flexibility. Doesn't work? I kill the program. Roaring success? I make it happen again. Easy peasy. "

Happiness to be involved in the work! "Happiness comes from seeing the faces of the people you are serving in your community after they have just gotten done with a great program. Happiness comes from the question "Are you going to do this again?" Happiness is when a child brings you a drawing that you will display proudly. Happiness is doing fresh and exciting things for your community. Happiness is sharing a skill or information with a group of very interested people."

A chance to stretch creatively " I have an amazing manager who is willing to let me try new things which really allows me to push the barriers. Sometimes it goes better than other but I love thinking of new and exciting things for my littles and their families!"

Enjoying the reaction of the kids in the program. "my biggest happiness in programming is watching the children enjoy the program I've planned. I've done a few Mo Willems programs- Elephant and Piggie Party, Pig Day, Pigeon Party, and those have been so fun! I love to see the kids get excited about books, and then seeing the books fly off the shelves. The pure joy of it keeps me going."

What are your joys in doing programs. Share with us!

Thursday, June 5, 2014

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.

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

Wednesday, June 4, 2014

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