Beaded Creations: A Tween Program

I ran a no cost and extremely easy program last week that brought in 15 tweens for over an hour of easy fun that encouraged their creativity and imagination. You read the first part right: no cost. I called the program "beaded creations," and it involved nothing more than the craft supplies that took up shelf space in my office.

Supplies

I cleaned my shelves and pulled out two boxes of beads. These included a huge tub of pony beads, as well as a number of smaller beads, fancy beads, alphabet beads, and crystal beads. I pulled out a few rolls of regular yarn, as well as fishing line thin string, some elastic, and some wire string. I still had a ton of safety pins left over from Canada Day and so I pulled those out, too. I also took out a couple tape rolls and a handful of scissors.

Set Up

I put all of the non-bead supplies on one table, save for a few pairs of scissors. That table was at the front of the room so when the kids entered, they went there first.

I grabbed a pile of bowls from our staff lounge and put a few on each of the four tables in our programming room, dumping a mix of beads into each bowl. I'm not a purist by any means, and I know I like the idea of discovery, so I mixed all the different kinds of beads together. Pony beads were hanging out with the Fs and Hs, and the crystal beads mixed with the triangle-style beads.

The Plan

Guess what? I had none. I didn't come up with any patterns, nor did I come up with any sort of jewelry for the kids to make. Instead, this was more of an open studio program, where the kids could make anything their minds could come up with. I find these programs work extremely well for this age group; they're so creative and during the school year, they're so regimented, they don't get the opportunity to just play like they need to. Yes, I said it: they need to play.

This program brought both boys and girls. The boys had just as much fun as the girls. The idea that jewelry is a girl thing isn't really common in this age group, honestly. They just want to have fun, and I'm all about encouraging it.

A couple of our boys made alphabet necklaces using all of the alphabet beads in a nonsensical way, and one of the boys found half beads he popped onto his pinkie fingers and played vikings with (then he made them party vikings by putting a ring on the fingers beneath the 'helmets'). Girls made necklaces, bracelets, and one girl used a ton of the pins to make a birthday necklace (then she gave me one of her creations to keep!).

Lessons Learned

This program was so easy and it was popular. The kids asked me to do it again, so it's one I'll definitely try out again in the spring.

Perhaps one thing I didn't think about was how much knot tying the kids would want me to do. I didn't mind it at all, but when they asked me to tie knots for their little rings, well, it was a test of my own finger dexterity (I have tiny hands, but not that tiny). I think if I do this again, I might splurge and buy actual fasteners for the jewelry so the kids could make longer lasting creations.

These sorts of programs are great for cleaning out your supplies and for encouraging creativity, and they work so well with the 8-12 year old set. You don't have to reinvent the wheel for successful programs, nor do you have to do a lot of planning or prep work. Sometimes keeping it as simple as possible is what you need to do: for the most part, these kids want a safe place to be that's not at home and they want to hang out with people their age, as well as adults who like spending time with them and laughing with them.

Summer Reading Club: Week 5

Week five is out of sight and out of mind. We're on to week six tomorrow, which means we've only got two more weeks of summer reading club.

Maybe what's scary is that I've already finished planning my fall programming and have plans sketched out through next March already. I'm ready for something new!

This week, our registrations continued to grow. We now have 107 teens signed up, 76 pre-readers signed up, and 307 youth signed up. That brings us to almost 500 total! I am so thrilled with the teen sign ups, in part because it's a huge number for our small town, it's more than double last year's numbers, and it's higher than the numbers I pulled at my previous library system which served a much larger population. I'm thrilled, too, to see such a large pre-reader sign up.

In terms of programming this week, our numbers were down quite a bit. I think there are a number of reasons for this, but I'm not going to be sad to say we still had good numbers.

On Monday, we had our Lego Club and it brought 20 kids out for fun! Their creations are getting more and more complicated and huge. The thing I think I love most about Lego Club, aside from the creativity it breeds and the excellent displays we get in the children's room because of it, is that it really gets kids to collaborate. They work together on making things, and I love seeing that.

On Tuesday, we had our last system-supported performers, and it was a folk band. I was a little nervous at first, but they ended up being excellent. Even I had a blast, since I knew most of the songs. One of the things that we're required to do for these programs is have a sign language interpreter. We used to have a staff member who did it, but after she left, we've hired a local company to do it (we're home to the state deaf school, so this is a population our library serves regularly). However, for these programs, we don't usually have deaf attendees; this week, we did! And the girl who came had a total blast, minus a complication she had when her younger sister began heckling the band and not listening to her. I had to do the gross adult thing and call her mom at the deaf girl's request to say the younger daughter wasn't behaving. I never got an answer from mom, but it was one of those moments where I felt like I had to be a real adult (and reminded me of the responsibility I have to my kids, too). We ended up having over 70 attend this program, which is lower than most Tuesday programs and was a little disappointing for me, especially because the band was fantastic.

Wednesday was our regular tween program, and we did beaded creations. I plan on blogging about this program since it was marvelously simple and fun. We had 15 tweens come out (again a low number), and the kids made all sorts of fun jewelry out of beads. The thing I love about this age group is that the attendance was 50/50 male/female. Boys don't care they're making jewelry at this age, and they have fun doing it.

Thursday was our teen book group, where we discussed Holly Black's White Cat. We also talked about programming ideas for the fall, and they're all stoked about the events. As much as this group is a book club, I use them as my advisory board, too, and it's so helpful to have it all in one, rather than having multiple groups. They enjoy telling me what sounds good and what sounds lame. At the end of this meeting, I pulled out a bag of ARCs and let the kids dive in, then I went up to the teen area with them and did individual reader's advisory with them. I know what kinds of books they like since I see them every other week, and I love sending them home with piles of books to read.

We continued our mobile collection this week, signing up 12 teens so far for the reading program, and lending out about 20 books. I cannot emphasize how thrilled I am this program is in play and working out as it is.

This week is probably the last very staff intensive programming week, but it's one I have been looking forward to all summer. I've amped up the tweens and teens for their separate chocolate parties (where they are going to get messy!) and we have our annual recycled fashion show. Of course, these outside events happen during the most sweltering week of heat we've had so far this summer -- which means they'll be three times as fun.

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.

Going Mobile

Pictured above is most of my new teen mobile collection, built thanks to the generous support of the Family Dollar/YALSA grant I won for the summer. I've been asked a lot about it, and I thought I'd give the run down of the whys and hows of going mobile.

How it started

One of the challenges of our community is that, despite being fairly small, we are spread out. We serve hundreds of square miles of farm land, and we live in a county where there is no public transportation. Despite our library's fairly favorable location in downtown and about a mile from the schools, no location is ideal in a rural setting.

That got me thinking about teen participation in the library. Many teens can walk over after school for programs, but what about teens during the summer? Then I started wondering why I couldn't make the effort to serve the kids and do it where they were: the school. Summer school here is one month long, Monday through Thursday, and every kid who attends also receives a free lunch.

And here, I thought, was an opportunity I couldn't pass up. I could go over to the lunch room for an hour once or twice a week, bring a selection of books, and bring all of the necessary summer reading club materials, and then I could get the teens involved in the program without them needing to trek to the physical library building. Moreover, I knew this would be an opportunity to get to know the teens in my area a bit more and it would be a chance to gauge what kinds of books my teens were reading. Since my teen collection is upstairs and my office and the desk I work at are downstairs, it's not always easy to know what is moving.

Planning

Admittedly, I didn't go about this in the most logical way. The logical manner would have been getting in touch with the school prior to applying for the grant to set this collection up. The challenge to that, of course, is what happens if the grant doesn't get approved. I knew I didn't have the budget to fund this myself (at least, I didn't think I did -- more on that in a minute), so my plan depended upon the grant.

When I found out I got the money, that's when I got in touch with the school's summer school coordinator, as well as the school librarian. We met to talk about the logistics of the collection. I had envisioned buying a selection of new books and having the kids check them out with their library cards, but after this meeting, I changed my plans, and I think I did so for the better.

Some of the considerations that needed to be talked about included the check out process -- did the kids need their library cards? It seemed like a hindrance, since many kids don't have cards for the precise reason I mentioned before: transportation. Then there's the issue of fines: how do you charge for late or lost materials? That could get the parents involved and get tricky. Then there's the issue of storage and transport. That was the easiest to tackle.

After that meeting, I brainstormed and came up with a plan of attack: I'd buy only paperback books, teens could check out books with their library card, school ID, or simply their name and phone number, and because I was doing a paperback collection, I wasn't going to charge overdue or lost fees. Of course, I wouldn't tell the kids that. I just gave them a due date (the last day of summer school) and it would be taking my chances. I was lent a book truck from the school library and given space in the administrative offices to park it. Easy enough!

Purchasing and Organizing

Creating my collection was actually very easy. I've done a ton of book talking this year, and I had a good sense of the kinds of books my kids were interested in. So naturally, those were first picks. Following those, I decided to really focus on titles that the kids wouldn't get quick access to elsewhere: popular teen fiction written in Spanish and a selection of titles with appeal to reluctant readers. When I budgeted for the collection, I gave myself about $600 to play with. I believe I ended up spending about $550 and came away with over 80 books -- keeping in mind that Spanish books are almost twice the cost of English editions of the same work, I thought that money stretched quite well. I also pulled a few personal copies of extra paperbacks I had at home since I knew they'd go to good use here.

As books rolled into the library, I pulled my copies from the tech room. I didn't know how I wanted to mark them, but after thinking about how I'd use the collection after this summer, I figured I should follow our standard marking procedure. Barcodes and stamps were attached, but I did not include spine labels. I wanted to make this a true browsing collection, and since that step is a quick and easy one, it could be saved for later, when we included these titles in our general collection post-summer.

Since I didn't want to add these books to my library's standard catalog because of the set up of the program, I went about organizing the books through LibraryThing. I kept it quite simple, and I included a private field in my login side for me to include the names of the kids who checked out the title (along with their phone number and a record of how many times a particular title checked out). You can see my entire library collection by going here, and then toggle the library collection on the top left to "Teen Mobile Collection."

Preparing For Day One

I knew I'd have a cart available to me, but everything else I knew was on my own. I made two signs to post on the book cart and brought an acrylic holder to include a third. They all were simple, explaining that these books were from my library and anyone could check them out. And oh, here's a chance to sign up for the summer reading club. I emphasized that since the kids were already going to be reading for homework, they should sign up and actually earn prizes for their homework.

That's the line that sells them.

Along with those items, I brought with me a paper check out log. Because I didn't want to have the liability of losing a computer nor did I know about the internet availability at the school, I thought writing out the books and kids information by hand would be easier. I could transfer that information to the LibraryThing account upon returning.

I also brought a handful of summer reading program registration cards, reading logs, activity sheets, and prize money, along with envelopes that showed what the prizes for that week were (so kids who checked in the first day or any time after could know what the choices were and participate right there). We'd, of course, put their prize entries into the real buckets when we got back to the library.

Day One in Action

When I got to the cafeteria, where I was setting up for the kids lunch hour, I had no idea what the arrangement would look like. I came in, took a seat at the table nearest the front of the door, and got all my materials in order. I was ready!

At first, there wasn't any interaction. But then, the kids started reading my signs and talking to me -- so many knew me from the classroom visits, they felt comfortable just walking up and asking what I was doing. And when I told them, it was like I turned on the light. They were thrilled, and they were asking how to check stuff out, how much they could check out, and how they could sign up for the club. It was a wonderful opportunity to be face to face with the kids for even 30 minutes!

Filling out the registration cards and explaining the program was so much fun, and on the first day, I registered 5 new kids for the program (many who came to see me were already a part) and I checked out books to 5 kids, too. For getting no advertising in the schools beyond what I mentioned in classroom visits, it was a huge success!

When I got back to the library, I simply input the student information into the private field of the LibraryThing account, slipped the registration cards into our library's bigger file for them, and was done for the day. I made the mobile collection registration cards a different color than our regular ones, to make retrieving them for our return trips easy.

Days Two and Three and On...

On day two (which was two days later), we were able to register 5 more teens for the program and we received nearly all of the checked out items from two days before and checked out material to a lot more kids, too.

Day three, I let my intern take over completely. I want her to have this project now, as a way to really work with teens the way I know she wants to. She came back that day having registered three more kids and checking out a wealth more items. We also had people check in their reading logs, meaning that when we go back tomorrow, kids will get their prizes delivered to them.

That's part of the deal, of course: we're bringing the prizes to the kids, making their participation in summer reading little more than doing the reading and showing us their logs.

Impressions and Take Aways

This program was so easy to coordinate that I hope it continues in the future. I want to make it happen next summer and maybe in a more regular way. Integrating into the classrooms could be a potential next step, even. But for now, here's what I'm really getting from it:

• Kids are dying to read. They're interested in the popular fiction (and fun non-fiction) titles, and giving them few restrictions is key. Because in the end, they're good kids. The books will come back. They have been coming back for us each time we return.

• Getting to spend one-on-one time with the kids helps me learn who they are and helps them learn who I am, too. I had a brother duo come up to me, one in 7th grade and one in 10th. The 7th grader recited to his brother all about the program, verbatim, from what I had shared during my school talks. The 7th grader signed up eagerly while his brother talked about how it was a scam. I assured him it wasn't, but it was his brother who convinced him to sign up because he trusted me and knew me. Honestly, this was one of those moments that made me realize how important going TO the kids was. It builds a huge sense of trust in me and in my organization.

• We signed up more than 12 kids in our 3 visits. That's 12 more kids actively involved in our reading program. Would they have signed up if we weren't at the school? Likely not. We're more mobile than them, and we're catering to their needs.

• Hearing and seeing what books excites the kids helps me in thinking about not only collection development, but also in programming. My kids are RABID about Raina Telegmeier's Smile and Zombie Haiku. I sense a worthy program in comics and in, err, zombies.
  

• We're tapping an opportunity that has huge growth potential. Why can't we have this collection at other events where we'll see the kids? Maybe events where we'll see kids AND their parents, where then we can also get kids who don't have cards their own cards? This experiment will lead to more experiments, which, if I remember correctly, is one of the key aspects of being a librarian: trying things out.
  

Conclusion

We still have a couple weeks left of the program, so I'll update again at the end. I'm eager to see what changes and improvements can be made for the future, and I'm eager to see how much involvement we gain, now that the kids know we're there.

This is a program I'd highly encourage other librarians who serve teens to consider, especially if you find yourself in an area like mine, where transportation is a huge issue. And though the start up costs are high, they can be cost effective for any budget. All you have to do is pull paperbacks from your own stacks. You can save good books that come into your donations, too. Once you set up the initial collection, it's yours to use however. I plan on popping mine back into regular circulation at the end of summer, but I plan on keeping the LibraryThing list so I can pull these titles out again for other outreach opportunities.

Summer Reading Club: Week 4 (or the Half Past Point!)

It's officially past the half way point now, and I'm now counting down the minutes until summer reading is over. I'm also at the point where I know exactly all the supplies I need for the rest of my programs, which is to say, I kind of feel like it's under control and manageable.

But it was a big week, despite our offering a smaller number of programs. Our numbers are looking great, and I've officially met the goal I set for myself in terms of teen registration.

We have 100 teens signed up for summer reading, 68 pre-readers, and 294 youth, bringing out total to 456! We are on track to beat last year's summer reading numbers.

What helped bring our teen numbers over the 3 digit mark (thereby doubling last year's numbers) was the mobile collection that started this week. Starting last Wednesday, my intern and I will be visiting the summer school during their lunch period. During our visit, we set up a small cart of books and all of our registration materials (including prizes and prize money) for the kids to check out. They can sign up and participate with us at the schools, and they're welcome to borrow books for us during the duration of summer reading without their library card. The response we've gotten from this so far has been fantastic -- in our two days (about 30 minutes each time), we signed up 12 new summer reading participants and checked out as many books, too. I'll be posting about this huge and exciting project this week, but it's one that has given me excellent face time with kids in a way I would otherwise not get in the library.

With the holiday on Monday and my inability to gauge whether we'd be slow or we'd be swamped, I kept programming low key this week.

On Tuesday, we had an all-ages movie day and showed Gnomeo and Juliet. Because our programming room is tight, we have to limit attendance for these programs and require attendees get a ticket. I think the entire set up is very unfriendly, but it's how it has to be. To accommodate a crowd, I decided to hold two showings of the movie -- one at 11 am and one at 1:30. We had sign ups for both sessions, but I believe people kind of forget summer school began on Tuesday, meaning our first showing had no attendees and our second had 50. I had cookies and lemonade donated from a local service organization for them to enjoy.

Wednesday was our tween program, and we had a candy sushi and a movie day. I put out a couple examples of candy sushi (easy ones -- I cut a rice krispie into thirds, then put a Swedish fish on top and wrapped it in a thin strip cut from a fruit roll up and I took a giant marshmallow and pulled a Swedish fish through the middle) and I put out the supplies. We had giant marshmallows, Swedish fish, fruit roll ups, gummy worms, and gummy life savers, and we played Megamind. 30 kids came out, and they ATE. We ran out of half our food, so I went and replenished empty plates with more food from our cabinets, and it was all gone. I think tweens are better eaters than teens, so I know who I'll be turning to in the future to clean our extra snacks up.

Wednesday was also our first day doing the mobile collection, as I mentioned earlier.

Thursday, we had a teen program that everyone told me I was insane for running: tie dying. I did it outside under our tent, pulling out 4 tables and covering them in cheap (read: throwaway) table cloths. I told the kids to bring something to tie dye, and of the 16 kids who came, only 2 didn't have something. Luckily, the library is next door to the dollar store, so they walked over and bought something. This program was a blast, and I loved seeing the teens go to town dying. Moreover, I used this as an opportunity to feel out some fall programming ideas, and I think I've got some very excited teens. Clean up for the program was easy, since we just tossed the table cloths and excess dye we had (which was little -- the box claimed we'd be able to make over 30 dyed shirts, but we made 20 and hard little to no dye left). That's my shirt to the left. Not bad for my first time doing tie dye, huh?

Friday was our story time, and it was also the second day of our mobile collection. I had a blast listening to a pair of brothers, one going into 7th grade and one going into 10th grade. The 7th grader repeated, nearly verbatim, my speech I gave in his class about the program and all the cool prizes teens could win for participating, while his 10th grade brother thought it was all a scam. They bickered back and forth, with the 7th grader signing up and his brother telling me no way, no how, it was a scam. Then he came back 10 minutes later and signed up. Excitedly, even.

I've been thinking about areas of improvement for next year and areas of expansion, and one of the things that came up with this week was getting the school classes involved. I had a teacher ask for registration materials so she could do the program with her class, and I thought this was an opportunity worth pursuing next year. The teacher planned on using a lot of what I'd created in passive programming as classroom learning opportunities. Maybe next year, I'll reach out sooner to the schools and see if the summer school classes can incorporate our program in their curricula -- imagine the greater participation, too!

That said, I am a very, very, VERY tired librarian. I'm counting down to August 6th, our last day, and I'm counting down to a much earned vacation out of the country just a couple weeks after that.

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 Club: Week 3

The end of the third week of summer reading club signals to me that it's almost the forth week, which means we're almost half way through the program and through summer. It's both scary and mystifying -- how did it go so fast? It feels like it's going slow! Alas, it's been another good week, and this was the last week before kicking off a new program, which is our teen mobile collection.

This week's sign up numbers (as of Friday) indicate continued participation. So far, we have 83 teens signed up (which is way up from last year's 50-some!), 281 children age 4-12 signed up, and 67 pre-readers signed up. I'm incredibly pleased with the pre-reader sign up; I looked up last year's stats on the number of kids under 4 signed up for summer reading, and there were only 43. We're knocking that out of the ballpark this year, and I think it's an area I'll be thinking about more in the coming months, as well.

For those of you who do a pre-reader summer reading program, have you seen growth like this? What sorts of programs do you offer this specific age group? My area of expertise in youth services really is in the 8 and older category, so I'm curious what sorts of things you do for your prereaders and caregivers both during the summer and the rest of the year.

On Monday, we had our weekly Lego/Games Club, and we had 33 attendees -- the largest so far! I wasn't there, since I was in New Orleans, but it sounds like my intern did a marvelous job, and as usual, the creations the kids made were intricate and fun to look at when I got back.

On Tuesday, we had a storyteller brought in from our system. He was worlds stronger than the week before's performer, and he really got the kids engaged and interested in his stories. We had a total of 83 attendees, which is a good number. I was a little bummed, though, since it was probably the first perfect day we'd had all summer, and I hoped for a larger turnout.

Wednesday was our Tween Canada Day party, where we had 22 attendees. I talked about this program in depth here. As much as I love working with teenagers, I really have a soft spot for this age group. What I love about 9-12 year olds is that they're interested in making things, and they're not only eager to try things, but they're still willing to try new things (and they're okay with failing!). Not only that, but it's both boys and girls who love doing this stuff -- and they're willing to do both "girl" and "guy" activities without caring.

With the incredible turn out I've had this year for Tween programs, you bet I'll be incorporating it a lot more during the school year and reaching out to these kids.

I was out sick on Thursday, which was our teen book club discussion of Lish McBride's Hold Me Closer, Necromancer. I admit to not being into the book, and I quit after 100 pages (which, as you'll remember, I tell the kids to do if they reach page 50 and can't get into a book). My intern ran the discussion, and while the turnout was lower than prior book clubs, I heard she was fantastic with the teens and the ones who came had a good time.

Friday was our first storytime without our regular story time staff member, who took a job at a new library. It sounded like the kids had a blast though, as their laughter could be heard from the meeting room all the way in the children's room. I love when I hear them having fun!

Overall, it was a quieter week, but one where more and more kids were beginning to earn their prizes for reading. I've had a number of youth and teens finish the reading programs already, and now they're all in the midst of doing the passive programming portion of the summer reading club -- something I'll talk about more in depth soon.

This coming week, since it's a holiday week, means we'll either be slammed with patrons or will be very quiet. I've structured the programming to reflect this, choosing to show a couple of movies, rather than engage in staff-heavy programming.