A Mid-summer Reminder to Keep It Real (& Laugh!)

Of all the age groups I work with, I think I have the most fun with the tween crowd. They're an energetic bunch, fun to talk to, and they are down with doing anything and there's never any shame. I've been doing a program for them each week and consistently have great turn out.

Today's program, which I'll blog about later, was a beaded creations program. It was super laid back, and the kids could do anything they wanted.

You know what they wanted to do and I let them do, between stringing beads and making knots (me making the knots, not them, of course)? They wanted to play with my people clicker.

They had clicker races.
I challenged them to make it to some arbitrary number by the time I finished knotting someone's ring (seriously - they gave me these tiny strings to tie, and even though I have the world's smallest hands, it wasn't easy!)
They showed off how good they were at turning it back to 0.
One girl showed her little sister, who was 2, how to use it.

Then I told them if they were that into my clicker, I could do a whole program of it. And the idea not only excited them, but they suggested we only have one clicker for the program so they could all share.

I suppose this is like when I had a lock in, and the teens were most interested in using our cardboard Edward Cullen as an artistic canvas. His bedazzled jeans and glowing green gem eyes were the highlight of the night.

Sometimes, stepping back to think about the little things that bring your patrons joy is just a reminder that what matters to them is less what you do and more that you're doing something for them. That shows you care. And the more you laugh about the little things that bring the kids joy, the less the imperfections/problems/things that didn't go exactly as you planned matter.

Listed!

I posted about some of my trifold young adult book lists earlier, but I've added a handful more, and these will probably be the last ones I do for a long time. They're easy to take out of hand. But, feel free to steal and use as you wish. Just credit, please.

Books for Reluctant Readers

Clean Reads

Sports Fiction

Historical Reads

Mysteries

Summer Reading: Teen Edition

It's that time of year: the frantic time known as the weeks before summer reading. This year, I'm in charge of the entire shebang for kids age 0-18, so it's even more work than when I've done it before. But I think it's going to be mega rewarding, as well.

I'm putting together my presentations for classroom visits, and I wanted to share my middle and high school presentation. I'm pretty pleased, and as you can see, we've got insane programming and prizes for the kids -- much of which was donated or paid for through the YALSA/Dollar General grant I received. How lucky!

Again: I'm never going back to Powerpoint. Prezi is really the best way to give an in-person presentation, and it's way more fun to put together.

Teen Summer Reading Club 2011 on Prezi

Reader's Advisory for Teens

While waiting for my exciting news on the grant front, I got to work on reader's advisory for teens like crazy. We haven't had tools in print for the teens to use in helping them find good reads, and it's something I believe is important in getting them to find books that meet their needs, particularly since many teens are reluctant to ask for help. It's been my goal to get some trifolds done before summer reading kicks in, and I'm extremely pleased with how they've turned out. So much so, that I've uploaded a my reader's advisory tools to share with anyone interested.

I've got four up and ready for consumption -- they're all in .pdf forms and lack library branding, so you're welcome to modify for yourselves. If you repost these anywhere, please give me credit, but the lists themselves are yours to borrow from.

Enjoy!

They're all created in Publisher, and yes, I print them in color. It makes them pop just a little bit more. Also, since I've been asked and never mentioned it, I get all of my stock images from Stock Exchange. It is a fantastic resource for free stock photography. There are plenty you can pay for, but the free ones are really all you could ever ask for.

#RocktheDrop

I Rocked the Drop today.

Since it was rainy and gloomy in southern Wisconsin today, I couldn't leave my goods around town like originally planned, and since I was out of the library most of the day in a meeting, I did the next best thing.

First, the haul to be dropped:

I decided plopping them in my library's teen area on the big chair we have would be the perfect plan B.



I can't wait to go back tomorrow and see if any are there still or if they've all disappeared. I put a message up on our teen facebook page, hoping someone'll stop in for a nice little treat.

Rock the Drop: Operation Teen Book Drop

I will be participating in this year's Readergirlz Rock the Drop! initiative. I have so many YA books sitting in my house, and what a perfect opportunity to release some of these into the wild. I plan on putting a pile in my teen department at the library, but I also plan on a guerrilla-style drop throughout town. You bet there will be pictures to follow.

If you have a pile of YA books sitting at your home, consider getting involved. It's an easy project to take part in, and what better way to celebrate teen lit during National Library Week than to pass it along? Click on the banner above for more details and to print off the book plates you can slip in your book bombs.

Teen Tech Week: We Went QR

Two weeks ago we kicked off Teen Tech Week at my library with a very innovative program for teens: a QR treasure hunt. For those who don't know what a QR code is, it's a small barcode like the one above that can be read via a free app on one's smart phone or, as in our case, an iPod touch with a camera on it (the newest ones).

I was extremely fortunate in setting up this program, since I collaborated with Drea, who works at a library a couple hours south of where I am. I'd been planning on doing a program like this since the fall, and when Drea said she was interested in something similar, we decided to plan it together since it's a bit of a huge undertaking.

Before I dive into the nuts and bolts, I want to say that doing something like this does not require quite what we did. Drea and I both are fortunate to have had some help from a few authors to make some of the clues happen, but this is by no means necessary. And for those who might be interested and do want videos like ours, the ones we got were name free and with permission from the authors, we may be able to share our clues with you.

Drea and I spent a few hours one night plotting out the potential clues for our program. We wanted to make sure that while teens participated in this event, they were also secretly learning something about the library (and qr codes). So, we brainstormed what we had in our respective teen departments and what we could pull from. We ended up with about 20 clues that led teens through not only videos from authors, but to our respective online catalogs, book lists, and even to the posters and furniture. We also talked about which authors we might be able to have help us out, and we were blown away to get the help of Melissa Walker, Blythe Woolston, Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl, Melinda Metz, and Loretta Ellsworth. Each made us a short video (under a 1:30) wherein they were able to pitch their books and then drop a clue for teens to move through the hunt.

To begin this program, I had to make one large purchase: an iPod touch. This cost roughly $200. I decided to purchase this because in my area, teens do not have much access to smart phones. It seemed unfair to me to expect anyone to participate in a program without the expensive equipment. Fortunately for me, I received a donation from a local organization, and the money went toward this purchase. Additionally -- and this was the plan from the start -- I decided that teens who completed the treasure hunt would have the opportunity to win big for participating. The iPod would be the prize (restored to factory settings, of course, before they could pick it up). So, while this was a pricey start up, this ensured fair access to the equipment AND served as a prize/incentive for participation.

When I got the iPod, I charged it, as well as loaded a free QR app onto it. I taught staff how to use the equipment by encouraging them to run through the hunt so they could answer questions that might arise. In addition, I made all of the books involved in the hunt non-circulating; this was done in the event one of our codes would check out. Fortunately, we're part of a big enough system that kids interested in checking out these books would be able to get them in a day or two from another library.

There were few instructions for my hunt. The teens were given a small handout with problem solving tips (answering things about what to do if they lost the qr app while going through the hunt or wanted to exit a video). They were allowed to borrow the iPod for the program with a library card or student id, and they were led to the first clue seen above. That qr code led them to a video produced by one of Drea's teens that explained how the program worked. She also dropped them to their first clue -- a book about a Violet who walks a runway by an author with the last name Walker. Easy enough!


On the back of the book was the qr code. After snapping that clue, they were led to their first author video:



Cool, right?

I won't show off the entire hunt, but Melissa's clue took them to one of our reference desks (I made sure to put the same qr code on both desks to cover my bases).

And from there, they were led to a few other places, including:


A poster in the teen area. This qr code actually linked up to the catalog record for Beautiful Creatures, wherein Kami and Margaret talked about libraries and led them to the final clue.

Besides just static things, I also made the kids work for their clues with puzzles:


And then there was the book list clue. At my library, we don't have a reader's advisory program set up yet in the teen area (something I am working on), but this was a great opportunity to get one book list out on tech books. I noticed later that some of those lists were actually being used and left in places that weren't the holder -- a sign that the kids were using them!


One of my favorite clues was the QR code that led from the reference desk to a post on my library's blog. I talked about award winning books -- the Morris, the Printz, and the Cybils -- and then asked the teens to find the Morris winner. And how cool they got to hear from Blythe herself about what an honor it was to win the award!

Another clue led kids to crawl on the floor and look beneath the big chair in the teen department.

Our final clue was to the book Little Brother by Cory Doctorow (yes, this was purposeful). When kids snapped that code, they were led to a Google form to fill out and be entered for the grand prize.


The form asked them for the basics -- name, phone, grade -- as well as asked them to name three books or authors they heard from. I did this in the event one of the kids got lost in the hunt and skipped clues. The last question was whether they'd do something like that again. Every entry said yes (woo hoo!).

This program, while it took a bit of set up, was easy to run. It required staff involvement only in the iPod loaning process, and we're extremely fortunate that our teen area was close enough to the reference desk that we didn't have to worry about the iPod walking away. We also had identification for the user and informed them that the iPod had a tracking device on it (which it did). We had no problems at all.

The biggest issues we had coming out of the program was some confusion on the part of the teens in figuring out how to use the device. It's a time-consuming program, as a program with such a huge prize should be. One of my regular teens said it took him over an hour to do, but he enjoyed it a lot. I think the fact the teens got frustrated at times is important, as it's a lesson for them that not everything will come easy to them. But this was a safe environment to try things out and learn, and they got to try something with equipment that they didn't have to worry about breaking.

I would do this program again in a heartbeat and I recommend something similar to other libraries looking for a way to incorporate technology and reading. As someone who'd never used a qr code myself, I thought this was such a cool introduction to the power they have, and it really encouraged me to think about how I could incorporate these things into my work. I even wrote a grant application in hopes of a little funding to try using them as part of our teen summer reading program.

One big frustration I had with the program -- and one you should be wary of -- is that our wireless network did not play nicely with the iPod. The pop-up we have that requires guest wireless users to agree to behave on the network would not come up on the iPod, and we were unable to access the wireless. To resolve this problem, we chose to allow the iPod onto the staff wireless network, and staff members who lent out the iPod logged the teens onto the network. We had no problems doing it this way. I also locked down the iPod to ensure no additional apps could be installed, since those purchases would come on my credit card. Again, we had no problems. Teens are good people -- and they were way more interested in doing the program than trying to cause problems with the iPod.

Ever tried something similar or heard of something similar? Tell me about it.

Book Clubbin'

One of my dreams as a librarian was to start up a teen book club. One that was just high schoolers who could handle heavy issue books and where we could get into some meaty (but fun) discussions of the topics presented.

Color me thrilled when I not only got to start it but got the group of kids I got.

It all started with book talking -- I presented the idea to the kids and got a few bites that way. I talked to my regular teen volunteer who, at first, thought it would be a boring thing. Then as I told her more and more my goals and vision and the fact that I wanted to leave most of it up to them, the teens, she was hooked. I set up a planning meeting and invited all interested parties on one of the local high school's early release dates.

I had five kids show up. Five is huge! It was an excellent mix of guys and girls, and it ranged the entire school grade wise. We enjoyed cookies (which they would have been totally happy without, honestly), creating a name for our club, and coming up with some of the things we'd like to try. I'm a completely open and flexible person, and I'm extremely lucky in my job because my boss lets me try anything I want to. So when my kids say they want to do something, I'm going to make it happen if I can. At this meeting, I also got the kids to give me boat loads of contact information, including their phone number, email, English teacher, favorite books/authors, and preferred means of being reached. This last part is key to keeping in contact with them; mine want Facebook notices and texts, which I'm working on. At the end of our planning meeting, we'd picked our first book club book, a date to meet (and let me note -- I suggested meeting once a month but they insisted on meeting every other week!), a place to meet, and then my favorite part: I pulled out about 50 advanced reader copies of books I had at home and let them at it.

Those were some happy kids.

To facilitate picking a common book, I pulled about 10 different books sitting in our teen area that caught my eye or that I'd read about and gave some impromptu talks about. My kids picked to meet for the first time at Starbucks and their book of choice was Julia Karr's XVI, which came out in January. I had a slight panic about this since we had a copy but I didn't think I could grab up 6 copies of it by the time we'd meet. I ended up deciding to spend programming money on a copy for each member (they were paperbacks around $5 each copy) and numbered each one. I told the kids that I'd need the books back since they were library copies and I'm thrilled to share all came back in excellent condition. Those'll be used for a floating collection I've got in the works and for summer reading prizes. I took the books to the high school when they came in a few days later and got them to their English teachers to distribute.

When I dropped off the books, I included a note saying I'd cover the cost of one drink (~$3.50) and my biggest caveat: if you're not feeling the book, stop at page 50 and read something else. Give it a shot but move on if it's not your thing. I realize what a statement this is, but remember, my goal here is to encourage the love of reading and if you're not loving what you're reading, why keep going if it's meant to be for fun?

In the week and a half mean time between getting the books to the teens and the meeting, I did a few things. First, I got in touch with the author and set up a short chat for the end of book club meeting. Then I did a little thinking about activities we could do at the meeting and scoured the class2k11 website to find TWO fun activities. I passed off the cover redesign activity ahead of time via facebook and email to the kids so they could get a jump on it early if they wanted. Then I did my reading and wrote out some questions to discuss. I did not plan a single question for the kids to ask the author, though, and honestly, I left my discussion questions pretty minimal because, ahem, I did not finish the book myself. The other thing I did was pull together a list of possible next reads and grab a pile of galleys to distribute.

I showed up to Starbucks early and took one of our library netbooks with me to get the chat all set up. Then the kids came and we got to talking! Of our 6 members, only one person finished the book. And whereas most book clubs this could be problematic, this ended up being a huge opportunity to talk. We talked about why we did or didn't finish the book. But more than that, we talked about the huge topics at play in the book, simply because everyone who read it GOT THOSE. It was a fantastic discussion of media influence, government, and feminism/sexism, and we had a great time talking about the different things in the book that we did enjoy. So this is to say, even though finishing the book proved challenging, we had a lot of good things to talk about. We talked for about 30 minutes about the book before diving into taking a "hands on" photo from the class2k11 website and developed a small list of questions to ask the author.

While the kids prepped their photo, I got our chat rolling. We decided to use facebook to chat, since my library's facebook presence is actually a normal profile, rather than a page you can "like." This gives us chatting privileges. I hopped on and said hi to Julia, then took my kids photo, before getting back to the chat and our questions.

This chat was fantastic. The answers my kids got to the questions were so good, and not only that, but Julia offered US questions, too, which really got the kids rolling. We talked about who would play Nina in a movie, as well as whether we thought our world was moving toward the one depicted in XVI. We kept the chat to 20 minutes -- enough for 6 questions or so -- because that is about the attention span of me typing and reading answers to them. But here's the big heart warming moment: this was one of the coolest things these kids have done. Every one of them said this was the first time they got to talk to an author about her book and some were excited to be talking to someone "famous." This was what made it ALL worthwhile.

After chatting, we picked our next book and meeting location. Folks, even though I covered their drinks and food at Starbucks, they were begging to meet in the library next time so they could have a book swap. I don't think you need to go fancy or buy your kids to come. If you have fun and follow their interests, they will show up.

Picking our next book was a bit of a challenge, since I apparently drafted a good list of next choices. We had 9 of the 12 books starred as next possibilities, and we ended up throwing the titles all in a hat and drawing. I asked if they wanted to talk with the author (if possible) and it was a resounding YES! from all around. And I cannot wait to post about the next meeting because I have a discussion medium cooking up I doubt has ever been done before. . .and it was actually all their idea. I just facilitate.

So if you're looking to get a book club started, my advice is this:

- Get in with your local teachers. They know who their readers are. They know who'd be interested. Get those students' names and send them individual invites. This thrills them.

- Know your current teens and talk about your idea with them. Tell them to bring their friends. Word of mouth is key.

- Let the kids do the deciding. I have some parameters, but I keep them loose. I let the kids pick the club name. I let them draw a mascot. I let them decide what books to pick -- with my input simply to keep the choices manageable. I let them decide what things they want to do during the book club. Guess what? Good book discussions aren't necessarily vocal. Sometimes, it's through art. Sometimes it's by connecting to something in the book and making that meaningful. Let them express themselves as they want to.

- I realize not everyone has the flexibility I do in terms of where to meet. But try if you can to see where kids have the best chance of getting to. Let them pick times and dates to meet. The more ownership they have, the better.

- Keep your patrons informed. We post our book club info on our blog and website. I plan on making a bulletin board in the teen department showcasing the awesome stuff these kids are doing. It lets others know what you're doing and invites others to join. It also gives those core kids excitement. They MATTER.

- Have fun but be proactive. I am a very hands-off person in management, and this is good for most teens in a group this size. But there are quiet kids who are afraid to jump into discussion. Sometimes, you gotta call them out (nicely, of course) through easy questions. Ask them what they thought about specific things. Ask them to be the one to pick the book for next time. Ask them to talk about their favorite things. It works. But if it doesn't, remember this: they wouldn't come if they weren't getting something out of it, even if it's simply companionship from other teens.

I'll be back to talking about the book club again in a couple weeks to talk about other lessons learned. But in the mean time, what is your book club advice? What's worked and not worked? Share with me so I can learn more, too.

Books Talk: Say Something

If you are a teen librarian, and you aren't book talking, you are missing out on the single most impressionable thing you can do for your patrons: showing them people read.


I've been making the rounds in our local 9th grade classrooms and talking books. The kids have loved these titles, begging to take them from me. Because of tricky card issues, it hasn't happened as much as I'd like yet, but you better believe I'm planning a way for all the kids interested -- even those without cards -- to take what they want to home.


Here's my powerpoint and my titles. Each has had a wide appeal, but top picks have been Love Drugged, Confessions of the Sullivan Sisters, and Half Brother. We start each presentation talking covers, too, so I can guide the kids through making selections.

Nov2010 booktalk

View more presentations from aramteens.

Most appealing cover for the teens? Not That Kind of Girl. The girls say audible that it looks like an awesome book.

Don't be afraid to not talk, too. As you'll see, a title here has nothing but the cover. I pull up the best trailer on youtube -- usually the publisher's own -- and play it. I emphasize using this sparingly and only with exceptionally enticing trailers.

I won't talk too much more about my methods of book talking because (drum roll) you can read it in the December 2010 issue of VOYA.