Week 12 @ Canyon Country Library

It is only Wednesday and I was already able to finish up my hours for this week! The children's area has been extremely busy due to all the local school children being on Spring Break. This week I was in charge of one activity, helped with a after story time craft, and helped with another library activity. On the first monday of every month, the library hosts what is called "Crafty Kids". During this time children are invited to come into the library and participate in a craft. This week we had the children paint. I was in charge of the activity and I had a volunteer help me set up, clean up, and keep an eye on the children. We had taken paper grocery bags and cut them out into pieces, large enough to paint on, and passed them out to the children. Most everyone enjoyed the activity. We told them they could either take their artwork home with them or if they left it then we would hang it up around the library. Almost every child left their art! I am excited to hang them up or to see them hung up! 

Yesterday's story time was themed "Bugs". Christina read the children the book and I was outside in the children's area setting up. We gave the children large coffee filters and markers. They were told to color their coffee filter and then we sprayed them with water to let the ink from the markers run. After they had dried a little, we took pipe cleaners and made the filter into butterflies!  The children were so excited and loved this craft. There were two groups, each with over 40 children in them. I was very envious of these cute little butterflies everyone was taking home. They all turned out so well, each one was just a little bit different than the next. 

In addition to helping with the crafts, I also helped with a more passive programing. While Library Gaming is not completely passive it is very fun and the children love it. This week the group was small; typically there are over ten children in attendance, yesterday we had 6. We allow the children to play games such as Sequence, Uno, CandyLand, and a few other games. The children really like it but we constantly have to remind them to use their "library voices". I think it is interesting to have a game afternoon in the library, a place were books are typically read. But, these types of games can teach children many other skills they can't always get from reading. Sharing, logic, and a different type of thinking are all important strategies when playing games. 

11th Week in the Library

Last week was a very busy week for me in the library. I was invited to the youth services meeting, which is a meeting with all the branch managers, children's librarians, and assistants who help with the children's department. I was very pleased with not only being invited, but the results of the meeting. Most of the discussion was about the upcoming Summer Reading Program, which will start in June for us. The theme has already been picked, so much of the discussion and topics of conversation were about the website, buttons versus stickers, and prizes. I really enjoyed listening to the meeting as well as giving my input, even though it was very little!

In addition to discussing SRP, the topic of story time was also a decent size discussion within our meeting. Each branch discussed the three different stories times they put on and how it is has been going lately. In addition, each of us in attendance, nine total, did a small book talk about a book we are reading or have recently read.

The meeting last for several hours and it was a little overwhelming. However, I really enjoyed going. During my other hours I also worked at the children's reference desk for several hours. During these hours I have helped several children locate books for school, books for enjoyment, and for other reasons.