We’re Calling it Coloring Therapy

Here’s the deal-- I was unpacking something and it had 4 nice big sheets of paper in it, you know the kind of paper we use to draw on in 1st grade. I called out to Lucy, “Hey I have an idea--let’s put this paper out on the tables at lunch and just let the students color.” And that’s what we did. I taped the paper down on the tables and set out colored pencils. Made a sign that said “Let’s Color”. The students took over from there--during most lunches I had a small group around the tables coloring and laughing. And I feel better that I got one more use out of the packing paper before throwing into the landfill.

Lucy says: and no one colored or wrote anything inappropriate!!

P.S. Coloring Therapy is a real thing.

Yet another genealogy project--oh my!

I really like to collaborate with teachers--my library professor, Dr. Bucher, drummed collaboration and public relations into our brains and I took it as gospel!!! But, Lucy is going to be honest--there are times, when a teacher comes to me with a collaborative project--that I cringe (inwardly). This is one of those times. One of my favorite teachers approached me last week and asked me to talk to her students about one of my passions--genealogy. You may be asking yourself ,if Lucy is so passionate about genealogy, why did she cringe? Well, I am going to be honest. As a very amateur genealogist (really no more than a baby in the big world of genealogy), I have some problems with this type of activity at a high school. I worry about the child who doesn't know his or her father or mother, but listens as others can recite generations of their family. I worry that they will unearth family secrets no one wants dug up (hey, Lucy did this with her own family genealogy). Famous quote from my aunt: "why don't you let those dead people rest". I worry that they will get sidetracked by the myriad of overwhelming resources on the net, and get drawn down the wrong lineage line.

I have worked on a collaborative project of genealogy before with another teacher at my school. I will try to dig up the publisher document we made to go with the unit, and attach it to this post. I even talked our Gale rep into letting us have Ancestry free for one month.

So here is what happened--our students are so young, that they must go back many, many generations before they could even begin to find someone related to them on Ancestry. Most had no names past a grandparent--and some didn't even have that. Now remember, most public records start in 1930 and go backward in time. My grandmothers were in their adulthood at that time--but for most children today, we are talking great-great grandparents or further. Many would hit on a name in a town where they thought their family came from, but were frustrated because we couldn't prove the relationship. Few have access to courthouse records to get back that far--etc., etc. To me, the activity promoted sloppy genealogy at best.

Yes, there were some positives--they actually talked to the elders of their families, they learned what they could about their families, and it gave them a sense of appreciation of older people, their ancestors, and history.

So weigh the negatives and the positives before doing a genealogy project. If you choose to work with a teacher on this, I did find some nifty interactive sites that I think will work well with today's students. I am going to use MyHeritage with these students tomorrow.

Here are the sites I found:

http://www.myheritage.com/

http://www.geni.com/

http://www.werelate.org/

http://www.familylink.com/

http://www.famiva.com/

http://www.genetree.com/

Remember, we told you we'd be honest! Wish Ethel and I luck when we do our genealogy talk tomorrow!

Portable DVD players in the Media Center

We have teachers who show educational DVDs in their classrooms. Often, they have at least one student who is absent on the day of the showing, and they'd send this student to us to watch the DVD. Ethel and I got a little tired of pulling out our huge TV/DVD player on its tremendous cart and setting it up for one child. So, I had a little money in the coffers and Ethel and I did a supply run on the local Walmart. For around $112.00, I bought a portable DVD player, and today, it was called in to use! It worked like a charm--the student had her own set of earplugs, we popped the DVD in, and she plopped down on one of our comfy chairs! She really seemed to enjoy the experience, and the little DVD player was a whole lot easier to set up!!! By the way, I bought a Durabrand 10" portable DVD player. It totally rocks!

Recycling and Cute to Boot

We have four rather large showcases outside our Library (silly architect)! Mind you, they are showcases not bulletin boards, so they need to have 3D items in them. One of my pet peeves is an empty showcase or bulletin board. Here is what I came up with as a quick fix, when other groups are not using the showcase and they are empty. I collect very large cardboard boxes (like filing cabinet boxes) and cut them into large panels for drawing. Then I use that old monster called the Opaque Projector to draw on the cardboard panels. I use things like clipart books that are not copy righted. Once I have the picture outlined in pencil, I trace over it with black marker, paint it, and cut it out with a hobby knife or box cutter. The figures are almost life size--each has a word bubble sign. It only takes a few minutes to put them in or take them out of the showcases. I have made several sets that I will just reuse. Click on the slideshare below to see our latest display!

| View | Upload your own

Altered books--or a positive thing to do with Discarded Books!

Would you like to have teachers begging you for discarded books? If so, talk them in to doing a project with discarded library books as a culminating activity for a unit on a novel, or anything else that requires a creative approach! Our English 10 teacher had students make an Altered Book using as a culminating activity for their class. In the past, the book may have focused on a book they studied during the year that they liked, but the two pictured were made as a way to review the highlights from all their work in English 10 (World Lit for us). One of the books also contains poems and creative writing from the class as well. This activity greatly appeals to students who enjoy scrapbooking, or working with their hands to create. Think of students who need that creative expression.

Here are some websites and books to guide you:

Incredible Art Department Altered Book Lesson

TeacherTube videos on Altered Books (pull the page down--there are 3 from a teacher High School Teacher)

Lesson on Altered Books at Young Poets

What are Altered Books at Michael's Arts and Crafts

Altered Books on Squidoo

We bought these books for our collection for the students to use as examples:

702 ARE
Arendt, Madeline. Altered art for the first time. New York :
Sterling Pub., c2005.
http://www.amazon.com/Altered-first-time-First-Time/dp/1402716559/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1201364783&sr=1-1

702 BRA
Brazelton, Bev, 1946-. Altered books workshop : 18 creative
techniques for self-expression. Cincinnati, Ohio : North
Light Books, c2004.
http://www.amazon.com/Altered-Books-Workshop-Techniques-Self-Expression/dp/B000X1N3PU/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1201365061&sr=1-1

702 HAR
Harrison, Holly. Altered books, collaborative journals, and
other adventures in bookmaking. Gloucester, Mass. :
Rockport, c2003. http://www.amazon.com/Altered-Collaborative-Journals-Adventures-Bookmaking/dp/1564969959/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1201365154&sr=1-1


702 MAT
Matthiessen, Barbara. Altered book collage. New York :
Sterling, c2005.
http://www.amazon.com/Altered-Collaborative-Journals-Adventures-Bookmaking/dp/1564969959/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1201365154&sr=1-1

702 mic
Michel, Karen. The complete guide to altered imagery : for
collage, altered books, artists journals, and more.
Gloucester, Mass. : Quarry Books, 2005.
http://www.amazon.com/Complete-Guide-Altered-Imagery-Mixed-Media/dp/1592531776/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1201365406&sr=1-1

745.593 URE
Ure, Susan. The altered book scrapbook. Ogden, UT : Chappelle,
c2006.
http://www.amazon.com/Altered-Book-Scrapbook-Susan-Ure/dp/1402752024/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1201365258&sr=1-1

Geez, now that I am looking at this list from my Bookbag on OPAC, I am wondering why they aren't cataloged together. Lucy and Ethel will have to work on that in our spare time!

Visit THE HARLEM RENASSANCE @ your Library

Had this idea in the summer and we are going to try it out this February. During the month of February we will celebrate “THE HARLEM RENASSANCE” in honor of Black History Month.

Here’s the plan. (We will let you know in March if it was a success or not)
During the month of February we will have the following activities in the Library:

Afternoon At The Movies-This will be after school and we show A Cabin In The Sky. This movie is short, 98 minutes long. A Cabin In The Sky was a groundbreaking production for its time due to the decision to use an all African-American cast. In the 1940s, movie theaters in many cities, particularly in the south, refused to show films with predominately black performers. I know that 1943 is a little past the Harlem Renaissance time period, but the actors and actresses in this movie were part of the Harlem Scene. As normal we will have free popcorn and sell drinks.
*Blues and Jazz for Lunch – During our 4 lunches we hope to have one of our assistant principals and friends play the music of the 20s. If this falls through I have CDs we will play during lunch one day (it scares me when I have to depend on other people).
* Sweet Potato Pone Tasting – If you research foods of the Harlem Renaissance, you will find that it focused on Southern Soul Food. This is because of the great northern migration of Black Americans to the cities. We wanted to do a tasting, but we live in the South so most Southern Soul Foods are foods our students eat on a regular basis. One that I found that we don’t seem to eat in North Carolina (but they did in New Orleans) was Sweet Potato Pone. This is something between a Sweet Potato cake and a sweet potato pudding. We are going to be the baker of this recipe, which Lucy found on the Internt
*A Rent Party – Our visions of a Rent Party. This will be during lunches so we can not sell food (state law). Instead, we will sell turns on the Video Game called “Donkey Konga” (you also could use Guitar Hero or Rock Band) If I am now talking a foreign language to you, ask the students-- they would love to fill you in on all the new games. I have Donkey Konga set up as a 4 player game and students will pay 10 cent per player per game. We will talk about what a real Rent Party was like in the 20’s and 30’s .
*Lindy Hop and Charleston-During lunches one day, I have asked the Dance Club to do a demonstration of the Charleston and the Theatre Class to do a demonstration of the Lindy Hop. I have,You Tube Video to show on the Smart board if these demonstrations fizzle out.

There you have it, one busy month-- to be so short.

Yes, we check out Magazines!

Several years ago we did away with the periodical room. For one thing, nobody here still uses a print magazine index, now that we can our state database, NCWISEOWL (and don’t forget Google). So now that we are not a museum for old magazines, here is what we do. The current issue of a magazine goes out on the magazine racks as normal. We slap a barcode on all back issues and let the students check them out just like a book. We tried using envelopes with a temp barcode and the envelopes came back mangled. We find that it works best to put a barcode on the front cover and let it go just like that. Yes, some magazines come back mangled as well and we just delete them. That keeps them weeded and pared down. We do not keep more than 24 back issues and most magazines don’t even have that many. Our RIS (in-school suspension) classes come in about twice a day to exchange magazines. Remember, boys especially love short pieces of non-fiction and information like magazine articles. Struggling readers enjoy short magazine articles as well. We put the majority of our magazine budget into student magazines—we get LMC (Library Media Connection)—and that is it. If departments want professional magazines, then they can buy them out of their budget. In this media center, we focus our money on students (Lucy learned this after spending many years wasting money on professional magazines that the professionals never read).

We purchase about 40 different magazine subscriptions for our students.

Dry Erase Markers

Here’s a neat trick. We like to write on our windows in the Library. This Christmas, my window markers were just not working very well--we could hardly see them. So I grabbed a white board dry erase marker and it worked better than the markers made for windows! I already had a bunch, in all different colors. We left the writing on the windows for about 20 days and it came right off with water and/or glass cleaner.

P.S. we love to use rubber cement to hang letters or fliers on the windows also. When you take them down just wash the window and it comes right off.

Buying Books for Teens

Ethel and I like to think we run a pretty busy teen library. We try to think like teenagers when selecting books and putting up displays (scary thought, that one), and we are successful. Several years ago, I wrote a grant and part of that grant process involved surveying all of our students on what materials they would like to see in the media center. Yes, we surveyed all 1200 of them. We passed out surveys in first bell, and had teachers collect them immediately. We put the results in databases--one for females, one for males. It was an eye opener--surprisingly, our students took it seriously. We realized many things--that students can name over 350 different magazine titles (not all appropriate for the library), that we have books already in the media center that they wanted (so we probably needed to do more PR on those), and many other interesting tidbits. If you'd like to see a copy of the survey we sent to students click HERE. Feel free to copy it. It is about time for us to do this survey again--maybe at the beginning of next year. The hardest and most time-consuming part was analyzing the data and putting it into a usable format. Lucy and Ethel do suggest you try it--you will learn so much from your students!

Jazz it up! Recycle and Reuse

Our school has some really old looking AV carts rolling around in it. When the teachers come to check one out and we try to give them the old green cart instead of the newer black ones, they whine, "Can I have that one over there? It's prettier". This drives me crazy so I started thinking about how can I give these poor unattractive carts a make-over. Here's what I came up with. Details:

Can of black spray paint - Wal-Mart $0.96.

2 Grip-It-No-Slip Placemats on Clearance - Targets $0.25 each.

Can of green paint I picked up from the school yard the Sunday after Homecoming. I try to go out to the school the weekend after homecoming. Kids have taken apart their floats and have left wonderful treasures behind.

A little creativity and about an hour of my time total. (10 minutes spray painting it black, 45 minutes painting dots.)

Ta Da! Now every teacher wants to check out "my little Pygmalion"

Options: I have also just painted them a pretty color and used one roll of the Grip-It-No-Slip shelf liner from Dollar Tree to cover the shelfs. ($1.00 per roll - one roll will make a runner down 3 shelves). If you don't have the time, energy, or talent, send the carts to your art department and let the students jazz them up.

Give us your ideas

Mini Workshop, Classes and Events

Lucy and I love to hold small workshops, classes or events for the students, during lunches or after school. We believe that learning can be fun. Some of the workshops and events we have shared over the last few years are listed below. We keep the library open to the rest of the student body during most of our workshops. Sometimes a student is too shy to attend the class or workshop, but will watch intently. This is ok with us because they are getting something from the activity and maybe next time they will join in. All teachers and instructors donate their time. We have no budget for these activities. You can get started by finding out what special skills or talents your staff has, and talking them into sharing those skills or talents with small groups of students. Let us know what you are doing. We are always looking for another great idea.

Knitting Lessons (during lunches)

Lucy has given knitting lessons for the past 3 years. There is a fee for yarn and needles or the student can bring their own, and then the class is free. We invite all the faculty that can knit to come and help with the lessons.

Calligraphy Classes (during lunches)

We have several of our faculty members who can do calligraphy. During lunches, once a week, for a month, we held a mini course in calligraphy. (The teacher who was the instructor had a planning bell during our lunches). There was a fee for this class, $2.00 for a calligraphy pen or free if you brought your own pen. We had faculty and students signing up for this one and about half were boys.

Ballroom Dance Lessons (during lunches)

A month before the prom one year we held dance lessons during lunches. Our theater teacher had planning during our lunches and came in to do a mini dance lesson on a different dance, once a week for a month. We did the Waltz, the ChaCha, the Rumba, and even a little swing dancing. Believe it or not, one week we had to send the boys to the lunch room to find girls to dance with. Yes, we had more boys than girls. After this month of moving tables we went out and purchased Magic Sliders for our tables, so they would move easier.

Line-Dancing Class (after school)

Another year, the week before spirit week we held a line-dancing class to get ready for the big homecoming dance. Once again we had a teacher who could teach us some line dances. We had her teach "The Hustle" (because Lucy and Ethel danced the hustle when they were in high school) and "The Cha Cha Slide". (Lucy and Ethel were clueless to this one, but liked the music.) I brought the CD called "30 Greatest Party Songs Ever" (from Drew's Famous Party Music Series). After the lesson we even had a little fun doing the "Macarena" and the "Chicken Dance".

Chop Stick Workshop (after school)

We have a small Thai community in our county. We asked a couple who had owned a Thai Restaurant to come in and teach us how to use Chop Sticks. We had about 16 faculty and students sign up. The fee was $2.00 for chopsticks and the food to practice with. I got the chop sticks from the local Chinese restaurant for .10 each. We also had a student who had lived in Japan for 6 years and an English teacher on hand to help teach. This workshop was great fun.

Tie Your Tie Workshop (How to tie a necktie) (during lunches)

In this workshop we teach students how to tie a necktie. This workshop is free, but we asked the students to bring in a necktie. It turned out most did not bring their own ties. I put up a flier at my church for the men to clean out their closets of their old, out dated ties and donate them to the library. I now have over 60 ties to use for this workshop. We get faculty members and retired men from the community to come in during their lunch to teach. We set up some full-length mirrors, print off a few handouts they can take with them after the lesson. Voila, we have another workshop. We also pass out the ties to the boys who show up to Graduation without a tie.

Heads Up Workshop (How to get and keep good posture) (during lunches)
After the first tie your tie workshop we thought we should do one mainly for girls. I wanted to have a "How to Walk in Heels" workshop, but it turned into a good posture workshop. One of our local chiropractors sent us his assistant to talk to the students about good posture, heavy backpacks and other spinal issues. This workshop was free to students.

Yoga Class (after school)

One of our teachers taught a yoga class after school, once a week, for a month. This class was free, but we had some money left over from the chop stick workshop so we brought some yoga mats and had a drawing each week for a yoga mat. Then we turned down the lights, turned on the music, and twisted our bodies into pretzels. We thought this would mainly be a girl attended class, but 50%, who attend were boys.

Yoga for Stress relief (during lunches)
One year we held this workshop the week before exams. We had the same teacher, who taught yoga come in and talk to students about yoga posses they could in their seats, or at a 3 minute stretch break, during exams.

Afternoon at the Movies (after school)
Our school has a Public Performance Copyright License for movies. Sometimes we show a movie after school just for fun. Our school runs late buses at 4:50, so our movie must be fairly short. I look for movies that run about an hour and a half. Be careful with the time. I researched the time lenght of Hitchcock's THE BIRDS and it would work in my time schedule. However, I had looked up the time on the VHS tape and then I rented it on DVD. The DVD had added footage that the tape did not have, so the students had to leave before the movie ended. The movie is free and we serve all the popcorn they can eat. We sell drinks and that covers the popcorn cost.

Scary Smelly Cheese Tasting (after school)
We did this around Halloween and the students paid $2.00 for the cheese tasting. We showed about 5 minutes of a video called "The Cheese Nun" about how the mold in cheese is different from region to region. We talked to the students about veined cheeses, then we had a tasting of four different cheeses.

Mexican Hot Chocolate (after school)

We sold Mexican Hot Chocolate for Hispanic Heritage Month Sept. 15 - Oct 15th

Macarena Mondays (during lunches)

A quick and easy event is to have Macarena Mondays. Durning the last 5 or 10 minutes of each lunch move your tables and put on some music and everybody now, LET'S MACARENA. (LIMBO anyone?)

Library Media Bonanza!

We got this idea originally from a middle school in North Carolina -- she had a presentation about her Media Bonanza day at a NCSLMA conference several years ago. We have since adapted it to our library. This is our second year! Library Media Bonanza is a day we close the library (except to check out books), and host a staff development opportunity for our faculty. We talk our tech department into participating as well. This is a self-paced staff development where teachers can move from station to station at their own pace, and ask questions along the way. We also put out displays of new or notable books, DVDs, and Videos. This year, our stations included Ethel on Finding Curriculum-related Podcasts, Lucy on how to operate the presentation carts and smartboard, a tech on mobile lab training and questions, our tech supervisor on Groupwise Mail and Calendars (and any other tech discussion). I am posting below some of the photos. We tried to lure them in with hot spiced apple cider and door prizes. I would love to say it was wildly popular and attended by all, but it wasn't. Teachers could come in either during their planning bell, or after school. The 28 (out of a little over 100) members of our faculty who did attend seemed to learn something and enjoy it. Ethel and I are still puzzling over what it would take to get faculty to attend! We'd love to hear comments from others who do successfully offer staff development.

Warning: our pictures are a little dark--our flash did not go off. We thought you may pick up ideas from even our displays and signage. Our easels all come from Dollar Tree. We also used discarded books with bubbles we printed that prompted teachers with questions we often get.