Monday, February 29, 2016

Making Bookmarks

Hello,
I like to have bookmarks on hand for the students to take when they come to the library. It can get costly, though. Tammy Worcester gave a presentation at a conference and one of the ideas was how to make your own bookmarks using Powerpoint slides.
Open up Powerpoint and change the slide to a blank slide. (Enjoy the pictures on the side. I have dual monitors and when I capture a screen shot, it also captures the second monitor picture.)



Next, click and turn on the ruler option. Mine looks like this. I went to the View tab and clicked Ruler.



Draw a line down the center. Go to the Insert Tab, and click Shapes. Choose the Line or the Line with an arrow and draw your center line.



Then, draw two more lines on each side dividing them equally making four equal sections.



Next, insert text boxes into one section and design your bookmark. Use clip art and students won’t need to cite sources. Copy and paste your bookmark into the other sections, or design each bookmark to be different.





I like to print them onto cardstock and then cut them apart on the lines. This is a good idea for book reports, too. Students can make bookmarks to encourage others to read the book they read.

At times a book I read has a recipe in it and I am usually asked for the recipe since only one student can check out the book. I have put the recipe on bookmarks for students to take. What information do your students need to study? Make a bookmark or have them make one.

If you want double-sided bookmarks, just add a second slide divided in exactly the same place, create your second side and print it double-sided.

I hope you enjoy this creative idea and also an extra day this year. Happy Leap Year Day!

Audrey


Monday, February 22, 2016

New Books, and I Mean NEW

Hello!
I have some new books for you. I told you about the Sunflower Award that I do here at Rogers. I only have a handful of students who are actually reading the books, but I’m glad to have some great stories for those few readers. I am now reading the books I plan to use for next year. All of these books have been published in 2016.


Pax by Sara Pennypacker. I just finished one called Pax by Sara Pennypacker. You might recognize her for her Clementine series, which are fun books, too. This book is very different from those, though. I was curious about it because there is a lot of buzz in the library publications about it. When I first saw the book, I thought it looked nice, but not my style. After seeing it multiple times and having a friend who teaches English ask me about it, I finally decided to order it and read it. I am so glad I did.
Pax is about a fox and a young boy. War comes to the area and the father enlists. Mother has died, so Peter, the boy, is sent to live with grandfather. Grandfather won’t tolerate a pet fox, so father makes Peter release Pax into the wild. Pax has been raised as a pet dog, so he isn’t accustomed to being alone in the wild, and Peter knows this. The story moves chapter by chapter between Pax and Peter. While I read a chapter about Pax, I was wondering how Peter was doing, and then reading about Peter, hoped Pax was OK.
If you decide to get a copy, I don’t think you’ll be disappointed.


The Skeleton Tree by Iain Lawrence. For those who enjoy a good survival story. This takes the story of Hatchet by Gary Paulsen to a new level. In this story, twelve-year-old Chris starts on a sailing trip with his uncle. He discovers that an older boy, Frank, is also along. Within 48 hours, the boat sinks and Chris and Frank are the only survivors. They have no radio, no food, not much of anything. Frank seems to hate Chris but they need to get along if they are going to survive. In the wilderness of Alaska, there are many problems to overcome, the least of which is the weather. This book has a twist that I wasn’t expecting which makes things really interesting.


Ruby Lee and Me by Shannon Hitchcock. The year is 1969 and integration has come to Sarah Beth Willis’ town. Her best friend in the summertime is Ruby Lee, a black girl, but when school begins, their friendship will not be the same. Black children and white children are not best friends at school. Sarah just doesn’t see how or why this should be. But there are a lot of changes for Sarah this year. Her little sister, Robin, has been in a very bad accident and Sarah believes it was her fault. The family has to sell their home and move to a smaller one in town in order to pay hospital bills. Sarah has to adjust to all these changes plus a new school and a new teacher. At the end of the book, the reader discovers that the story is true. It is the author’s story.


Lizzie and the Lost Baby by Cheryl Blackford. During World War 2, children who lived in London were sent to the country to stay with strangers there in order to keep them safe. Lizzie and her brother end up in a foster home where the people aren’t unkind, but don’t really want them. One of the people they stay with appears to be crazy. Nearby are a family of Travelers, or gypsies. They have their own problems and due to one problem, a baby is left alone. Lizzie finds the baby and tries to help by taking the baby to her foster parents. The crazy lady believes this is her baby who died a few years before, and she keeps the baby. Meanwhile, the gypsies are searching for their lost child. Soon, Lizzie meets with Elijah, the brother of the lost baby. She realizes who the baby belongs to, but now is unsure of what to do. Should she give the baby back to Elijah, or should she just keep quiet about it?


I hope you have a great week.

Audrey

Currently Reading
The Head of Kay’s by P. G. Wodehouse
In a French Kitchen by Susan Herrmann Loomis
Anna and the Swallow Man by Gavriel Savit
This Side of Wild by Gary Paulsen

Tuesday, February 16, 2016

Policies for the Library


Hello,

I have talked about library policies previously a time or two. If you have library policies in place right now, just go and see if you need to do any updating on them, then you can quit reading.
If you don’t have library policies in place, then this is the time to get started. I suggest that you have two policies. One will be the policy for your students and any community patrons that you have. These can also be separated if that is easier for you. I have separate policies for students and community patrons because I have a good number of community patrons. I have them update their information each year and their ‘card’ is renewed yearly.

STUDENT POLICY

In your policy for students, include simple things like how many books may be checked out at a time and how long the check-out period will be. If they do not return a library book, what will the consequences be? Will you charge fines? How many times may a book be renewed?

COMMUNITY POLICY
You may not have community patrons, but you never know. Do you have any homeschooling families who might want to use your library? If you need a community policy, include the same things and add the best times for a community patron to check out. In mine, I also let them know that if a student or teacher needs a particular book that they happen to have, we may need them to return it before their due date since the our students and teachers have priority to library materials. I also limit the loan of seasonal books and particular subjects if a classroom has need of them.

SELECTION POLICY
I have a selection policy that gives a description of criteria we use to select our materials and the care of our materials.

RECONSIDERATION POLICY
The last policy is one that seems to be fairly unimportant, but is not. It is the Reconsideration Policy. This policy is in place in the unlikely event that a parent or student feels that a particular book or material is not appropriate for the school library. Most of us when faced with a particular book might just say, “You’re right,” and just discard the book. However, this practice opens the door to anyone just saying that a particular book should be discarded when they haven’t even read it or know what it is about. It really is much easier on the librarian or teacher to say, “You may be right about that. Will you please fill out this form and I will take it to our committee and we will reevaluate the book?” This puts the power in the teacher’s corner and the person who is complaining will need to justify their complaints. If you happen to agree with the parent, you can also add, “I’ll just temporarily set it aside until the process is over,” and then you can find a place for the book. Once the form has been submitted, then take it to your committee. Your committee can be your school board, or if you are in a larger school, choose a parent, a teacher who teaches at the grade level the book is appropriate for, and your principal to help you. Most likely you will never need to meet with your committee since this will probably never happen. But it is good to be ready for an unlikely event. You have fire drills regularly? Have you ever had a fire? Probably not, but you are ready for them in case.

I wish many times that I had had a Reconsideration Policy in place at my first school. A parent came in to complain about a particular book and brought our pastor with him. I spoke up for the book and asked if either of them had read the book. No, neither one had. There was a bad word in the book, but the story was very inspiring. The father and pastor only saw the bad word and came running. If I had a Reconsideration Policy, they would have had to stop and think about the material instead of just reacting. It would have helped me to diffuse the situation in a positive way, rather than being put on the defensive.

I will attach my policies for you to look over. If you need a policy and like how mine reads, please feel free to tweak it to fit your school.

Have a great week!

Audrey

Currently Reading
The Head of Kay’s by P. G. Wodehouse
In a French Kitchen by Susan Herrmann Loomis
Locally Laid by Lucie Amundsen
The Gold Shoe by Grace Livingston Hill


Tuesday, February 9, 2016

Periodicals

Hello,

Do you receive magazine for your school library? Many times a magazine is something that our reluctant readers will grab and look through or read rather than a book. Over the years I have eliminated a few from my list plus others that have gone out of print. For the most part, I suggest that you subscribe to magazines that supplement your curriculum or what is important at your school. Our school has a junior high ski program, so we subscribe to Ski.

I am often asked what magazines I subscribe to or what a small school should subscribe to. I subscribe to a number of publications put out by the Cricket Group. These usually have one theme per issue and are wonderful for research purposes. We treat them like books and do not weed them out after a few years. The cost is fairly high for each, but if you think of each issue as a $3.75 book, it isn’t too bad after all. Most of these are not the kind of magazine that you will toss after a few years because it is outdated. Each subscription is $33.95 for 9 issues a year.

Cricket Group
Ask – 6 – 10 years – Scientific articles and activities
Cobblestone – 9 – 14 years – American history
Dig into History – 9 – 14 years – Archaelogy and the ancient world
Faces– 9 – 14 years – In-depth look at a country, culture, or idea
Muse– 9 – 14 years – Science and arts

If you could only get one subscription, I would suggest you choose Cobblestone. If you were to add another, I would add Faces. These two magazines will help supplement the study of American history and world cultures for your students in grades 5 – 8. We have our copies of Cobblestone and Faces since each magazine was introduced and have not had any duplicates. Next I would add Muse to the list to support your science curriculum. If you just got these three, you would have spend $100.00 and are now adding what you could consider ‘short books’ to the library each year.

Other magazines that are popular here are:
American Girl
High Five (from Highlights magazine)
Ingredient (a magazine for kids on healthy food and cooking)
Motocross Action
Mountain Bike Action
National Geographic Kids
Popular Science
Radio Control Car Action
Ranger Rick
Science World (a Scholastic classroom magazine)
Sports Illustrated for Kids.

I know that your budget probably won’t support all of these magazines. My suggestion is to subscribe to three to five of your choice through the school and then check with your constituency to see if they can help with others. You may find that families might already subscribe to American Girl, Ranger Rick, or Sports Illustrated for Kids, or National Geographic or National Geographic for Kids and might be willing to donate them after they are through.

Each time you have conferences, you might consider putting your wish list on your door for parents to see. Years ago at Keene Adventist Elementary School, we were given large yellow stars by our Home and School committee. On each star we were encouraged to put an item that we either needed or wished we could have. My teaching neighbor decided to go big and put ‘overhead projector’ on one star and ‘new desk for teacher’ on another. She also filled out the rest of her stars with smaller items she wanted. She actually got a ‘new’ desk from a parent who was remodeling an office area and someone else bought her the overhead projector. This never happened to me, but the point is that you never know. Put your wish list on stars on your door and see what happens.

I didn’t put any religious magazines on here, but there are very few that are for kids. Most of our students receive Guide, Primary Treasure, or Our Little Friend at church, but it might be that the Sabbath School departments will donate any leftovers to you to keep in the library.
I hope you have found some information that is helpful to you in this post.

Have a great week.

Audrey

Currently Reading:
The Head of Kay’s by P. G. Wodehouse
In a French Kitchen by Susan Herrmann Loomis
The Litigators by John Grisham
Lizzie and the Lost Baby by Cheryl Blackford
The Gold Shoe by Grace Livingston Hill

Audio Books

Hello,

What is your opinion of audio books or books on tape? My opinion has changed over the years. I prefer to hold a book or my Kindle and turn pages as I read or be able to quickly go back and reread something. I am not a great listener and can get distracted while listening to a book and at some point, ‘wake up’ and wonder what happened in the story in the last ten minutes. So I have not really had an incentive or interest to get audio books.

However . . .

My son and husband have subscribed to Audible for a few years now and both love it. My son has a fairly lengthy commute to work and listens to books during the commute. My husband has times that he wants to listen to a book and has ‘read’ some of his favorites through Audible.

Most schools have a few students who are low in reading skills, but still want to ‘read’ the same books that their peers are reading. By listening and following along, they are able to get the meaning and the words they might have missed if just reading the book itself. After researching I realized that Audible wasn’t a good option for a school library. I have done my best to find audio editions of books that teachers suggest would be helpful for students.

At first, we shelved the audio books in a separate section and students or parents could just go to that shelf and find our collection of audio books. However, at this time we have them shelved on the shelf right beside the paper book. We encourage students to pick up both the audio and paper books and check them out together.

Some positives for audio books.
1. Good for a struggling reader.
2. Great for families that are traveling. They can check out an audio book or two and the whole family can listen in the car.
3. They aren’t quite as intimidating to children who might listen to ‘Little House on the Prairie’, but would never pick up a thick book like that.
4. It is a good way to provide differentiation for children in the classroom.

Negatives might include:
1. Tapes might become damaged or CDs lost.
2. Expensive.

Copyright law allows libraries to make a backup copy. I have made a backup copy and put the original CD or tape in a safe place. If the copy is damaged, I can make another copy of the original. Legally, I am NOT allowed to make multiple copies to share with a class unless I have the same number of audio books. One backup copy per book. So that does help with the damaged issue and expensive issue. They are more expensive than books, but the positives can outweigh the negatives and just might be the incentive to go ahead and purchase them anyway. If you only get a few each year, your collection will grow little by little.

So what should you begin with? What about some of the Pathways books or the supplemental books? They would support the curriculum if you need to justify the expense. Also consider getting some classics that will stand the test of time. This might be just the thing to get those books in circulation again.

So, back to Audible. Last summer I was going to have a 5 hour drive one way and again home at the end of the week. I asked my husband about getting a book for myself through his account and putting it on my phone or my Kindle. He encouraged me to get my own account. I blanched at the thought because I didn’t think I would use it enough and it would be a waste of money. I decided that I would get my own account and then cancel it if I found I wasn’t using it. I still have my account. I have a nice collection of books that I know I will listen to again and again, so I am glad I have it. I’m still not a good listener, but I’m improving!

Have a great week.

Audrey

Currently Reading
The Head of Kay’s by P. G. Wodehouse
In a French Kitchen by Susan Herrmann Loomis
Locally Laid by Lucie Amundsen
The Gold Shoe by Grace Livingston Hill