TED: Ideas Worth Spreading

Something that I continue to run into in my travels and perusing across the Internet is TED. In short, TED is a nonprofit devoted to Ideas Worth Spreading. The main way I've become familiar with them are the TEDtalks that I've watched, but I've come to find that this is just one facet of what they do.

TED includes two annual conferences held in the US, and a global conference held in the UK. They also have volunteers that work on translating TEDtalks into other languages. TEDx supports local communities that want to have a TED experience on the local level, and the TEDPrize awards an individual $100,000 to support an idea that can change the world.

As I mentioned, I'm the most familiar with TEDtalks, and just this aspect of TED is so cool that I needed to share it! There are over 1,100 free videos ranging in topics from libraries, to technology, to music. Originally, TED brought together people from 3 worlds; technology, entertainment, and design, but there are many talks that have nothing to do with those topics as well.

A recent talk that I found interesting was on Sixth Sense technology. If you like the video, check out the other TEDtalks that are out there :)

A Chicken Walked into the Conference...

Well when all is said and done...I couldn't resist sharing this joke that I heard at the conference :)
Thanks for the joke, Gregory Taylor.

ILA11 Day 1

Can't resist making videos sometimes :)

Never Hurts to Ask

So I was sitting down to write a blog post, and I was thinking that I didn’t have too much to write about. But, then I took a look at my calendar, and I realized I had done a whole bunch this week.

Ka-Boom was this Monday, and it was encouraging to get a full group again. Last month, we only had 4 kiddos, which kind of scared me. Do they not like the program? Did I not let people know? But, having 10 people again this month told me that last month was a fluke instead of the rule, and I like that.

We also did a slightly different set-up this time. Instead of doing a bunch of experiments, I just had some things set out, and the kids could experiment with them as they wanted to. There were some books to search through, a potato and a hammer to experiment with balance, and a microscope. Kids still seemed to enjoy it, and mixing things up is always fun.

On Wednesday I went to a workshop. The Inland Northwest Council of Libraries does an annual workshop, and this year it was on creating customer experiences. David Lee King, the Digital Branch & Services Manager at the Topeka & Shawnee County Public Library (kind of a mouth full), was the presenter. He had some great ideas on using your website and your building to create a better experience for our customers; you. In addition to his great ideas, David encouraged us to think about the material being covered, so my mind was stewing on how I could take his suggestions and make them work for my library.

Another aspect of my week was promoting our summer reading programs. Last week, I sent out an email to some of my contacts at the schools, and several of them have gotten back to me on ideas to promote summer reading. I guess it never hurts to ask, because you might actually get what you ask for.

One idea was creating video spots for video announcements at the schools. For one school, I’m creating the spot, but for another school, the video production class is going to create the spot. So, to give them the idea, I got to discuss my programs with some middle school video makers on Thursday. It was exciting to be in the schools, and to know that a whole bunch of kids are going to be hearing about the programs through the announcements.

That’s about all for this week, so I’ll catch you later.

Why wasn't I here last Friday?

How’s it hanging?

As some of you might have noticed, I didn’t get a Weekly Update out last Friday, and the reason was that I didn’t set foot in my library last Friday. For the past few months, I’ve been working with Erica and Sue from the Idaho Commission for Libraries on Teens and Technology 2011. In the past, the commission has offered web-based workshops and webinars that have helped Idaho librarians become more familiar with the latest technology. Although these workshops have been well received, the commission wanted to take a different approach this year. They decided to do four regional workshops across the state, and as I mentioned two weeks ago, I was the go-to guy for North Idaho.

Last Friday, January 28, was our 9 to 4 hands-on workshop at the Coeur ‘d Alene Public Library. We had eleven participants from Lewiston to Coeur d’ Alene, and from public libraries to school libraries. Our workshop focused on taking a booktrailer from a storyboard all the way to a finished project posted on the internet. Although there will always be a few hiccups, the workshop went really well! The librarians said the workshop was helpful and informative, and they were appreciative of the work we had put into it. Made the last few weeks of working on it totally worth it!

The Monday after the workshop, January 31, I got to go down to Mountain States Early Head Start for their Men and Kids program. I’ve been going down to this program once a month, and it’s always hard when only a few dads show up. But, this time around, we had a great turnout, which was exciting. Often times, fathers aren’t encouraged to spend time with their kids, or they just don’t have the time to do it. For that reason, I thought having a program that exclusively targets dads spending time with their kids was amazing, and I hope it continues to grow.

This morning, I had another opportunity to spend some time with younger patrons. The first Friday of every month is my outreach to the Kinder Center. Since I only see them once a month, I figured I would do some Valentine stories. Although the kids were a little bit squirmy today, we had a great time enjoying books together. In between classes, I got a chance to talk to Bonnie, the VISTA at the Kinder Center about e-books. We both agreed that e-books are changing the way people view literacy, but we also both thought that traditional books won’t be obsolete any time soon. Only time will tell I guess.

Hope that you’ve had a great week, and I’ll catch you on Wednesday with another Book Blurt.

P.S. I updated our Teen Film Festival website this past week. It now has downloadable entry forms and a list of useful and free online resources. Check it out! http://www.libraryteenfilmfestival.blogspot.com/

I got my jaw broken last Monday...

No really, I did. On January 10, I paid to have my jaw broken to correct my bad under-bite. I then took a week off to ensure I was healed enough to go back to school and work. Luckily, that week was just what I needed; I was able to go back to all of my work and school this week, and I’m healing well. Although I’m healing well and there have been no complications, I’m still not able to eat solid foods. The nature of the surgery is to break the jaw on both sides, slide it forward, and hold the bones in position with steel until the bone grows back. Obviously, chewing on bones that aren't really there yet isn't such a great idea, so I’m on a strictly blenderized diet and I’m craving breads, chips, and steak. But, I know that the surgery will be worth it in the long run.

Anyways, it's still crazy that it is January 21 and this is my first blog post. Where did this month go besides the surgery? Well I know a little bit of where it went. Just before the Christmas break, we had a program similar to Airband Awesomeness called Jingle Bell Rock. We bought some pizza, lemonade, grabbed our blow up quitars, and rocked to everything from Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer to TNT. Even though we didn’t have people knocking down the doors, we still had a great group of interested teens who had way too much fun! If you want to see a little bit of the action, I made a quick video on it. Enjoy!

Over the break and through this month, I’ve also been preparing for Teens and Technology 2011, which is put on by the Idaho Commission for Libraries. There are four workshops going on across the state, and I’m the local “expert” who will be helping the commission present the information. It has also been my responsibility to create video making tutorials, so the participants have something to take home with them. I’ve really enjoyed getting to work with the ladies at the commission, and I’m pleased with the way the tutorials are working out. Then to top it off, I get to share my experience at the workshop, and then I get to fly to Boise in March to finish the entire thing off. I’m excited that I got the chance to be involved!

Alright last thing; I have already mentioned our Teen Film Festival, but now all the fine print is in place. You can visit http://www.libraryteenfilmfestival.blogspot.com/ for all the information. The website still looks pretty rough (it is still a work in progress), but all of the information you need should be there.

Hope your holidays were fantastic and your return to the routine was easy. Have a great weekend, and I’ll see you on Wednesday.

A Long Post on Science, Happiness, and All Staff Training Days

Well, well, well, well there is once again, so much to talk about. Blogs are funny things. I figure that I want each blog post to be between 300-500 words (closer to the 300 so I don’t get too wordy). That doesn’t sound like too many words…if you have something to talk about. There have been weeks where I sit for fifteen minutes staring at a blank screen, wondering what I did that week that would be interesting. But, then there are weeks like this week (where I’m still playing catch up) where that number of words won’t be near enough.

Anyways, let’s talk a little about what I did this week, and if we have enough space, I’ll back track to something I did in the past, but didn’t have time to talk about. This Monday, I had a chance to do my Ka-Boom Science Experiments program again. I just have to say, SCIENCE IS AWESOME! Of course, my kind of science is putting Dawn in some warm water and adding dry ice (just so you know, that particular experiment was awesome!), but science is just way too much fun to do, and talk about. I find that I’m getting a whole new crowd in the library for Ka-Boom, and they are critically thinking about why something happened in the experiment. Some of it they have just heard in school or at home. But some of it is legit curiosity and wonderings, and I’m glad I’m allowed to have this kind of program at my library! (If you think about it, Play-do here, and Dry Ice there tends to add up. But my boss, and my boss’ bosses are supportive of this program, and that also makes me excited. Also, for those keeping track, we didn’t have a special quest last week. Miss Emily, one of my colleagues, wasn’t quite able to join us, even though it would have been great to have her).

Also this week, I got a little bit of time to catch up on my email and social media postings which was nice. But, the other big event was the Community Library Network (more about what that means next week) All Staff Training Day. Each Veteran’s Day, my library network gets all of the staff from our seven (now eight) libraries into one building and does a conference. Lunch is provided (which is always nice), and the topics this year were marketing and happiness. The last couple of months, there has been a large marketing grant going on at my library, and the marketing topic was an update for the staff on what has been going on with their research.

The happiness workshop was put on by Anne Abrams from the Idaho Commission for Libraries (ICfL). She discussed research on happiness, and had us do some role playing activities which wound up being quite hilarious. The thing that stuck out to me about the topic of happiness is that your response to the topic of happiness comes down to your outlook on things (how much happiness or lack thereof that you already have). Having someone discuss happiness when you aren’t very happy doesn’t work too well, but discussing happiness with someone that is happy is sort of redundant. But, I think Anne did a good job finding research and some things to laugh at, and it can’t be a bad thing to be reminded of the benefits of having a positive outlook. I think myself and some of my colleauges were also quite ridiculous and tired during the afternoon, so there was plenty to laugh and be happy about.

Anyways, it looks like I’m already over my word limit, so I’ll sign off for today and see you on Wednesday for an uber-epic-awesome book blurt (not like all the rest of them haven’t been uber-epic-awesome, but I felt like closing the blog that way today).

Teen Marketing

Morning everybody! I’m often accused of being too happy in the morning, but I figure that’s a great problem to have.

Anyways, I first wanted to mention that I didn’t get a book blurt post out this week. I think I’ve mentioned it a few times, but my senior research class is quite a bit of work. I had a huge project due on Wednesday, and I dedicated the day to putting the finishing touches on it. I know, that is probably an excuse, and I’ll try not to let that happen again. I’ll definitely be back on Wednesday with an update on what I’ve been reading.

Last Friday, Alysun Sanders dropped in for a visit. She told us a little about her book, Talli's Tale, how she got published, and also about her new series she's writing, The Hollow Series. It was cool to actually meet her in person.

In other news, I feel pretty important. As I mentioned last week, the Idaho Commision for Libraries is doing a Fall Youth Services training, and they are having me present about teen marketing in Coeur d’ Alene and Moscow. As some of you know, I am a communication arts major at Lewis Clark State College, and public speaking is one of my passions. I’m really excited to share what I’ve learned about teen marketing with my fellow librarians.

But, then I have to ask myself, what have I learned about teen marketing? First of all, that it isn’t easy. Getting people to come to the library is difficult, and teens like a really good program. So I’ll keep working in that direction. Secondly, get the word out to as many people as possible through as many different means as possible; facebook, blog, twitter, youtube, flyers, and ridiculousness.

Thirdly, I think its taking one step at a time, and not being discouraged when a huge crowd doesn’t show up at your event. We’re making progress, slowly, but surely. I hope that anyone who reads this blog or has come to one of our teen programs has enjoyed themselves, and I hope to see them again as we keep working toward bigger and better teen programming.

So I’ll probably share that and a few other things to my colleagues at the trainings. In addition to the public speaking opportunity, I’m also getting to work with other librarians from the commission and another library, which is always a treat.

Making sure that my job isn’t normal, I got to help out at some second grade tours yesterday. Hayden Meadows sent three classes walking over to our building, and Miss Cassie and I had a great time showing them our different sections. The bookmobile garage was a huge hit!

Lastly, Airband Awesomeness is tonight at 7pm! Airband is pretty much the end of our October programs (other than turning in the pledge and project forms for Wrestlemania), and I’ve had a great time planning, promoting, and actually doing the programs. I’m excited to see any performers that show up tonight, and even if you don’t have a song, please come down and enjoy some great performances. Myself, a good friend of mine, and our library director, John Hartung (who himself played in a rock band in high school) are going to be the judging panel.

Hope to see you tonight, and if I don’t, I’ll be coming your way on Wednesday with a book blurt.

Authors and Reading Groups

For the past couple of weeks, I have been planning programs; sending emails, taking phone calls, making posters, and putting stuff in the courier. All of this planning is basically coming down to the next two weeks. You might ask why this would be the case. There are two reasons. First, I am striving to have one teen event and one tween event every month. This means that a lot of my time is spent planning for said once a month program. The other reason is that October 17-23 is the national Teen Read Week, and we are celebrating it with some programs!

Tonight I’m super excited to hear Alysun Sanders speak. The program is technically for grades 5-9, but anyone is welcome. I had a chance to talk to Alysun on Monday, and she is really looking forward to coming down. If you are interested in writing at all, or if you want to support a local author, then come on down tonight from 6:30-7:30.

Working backwards, I went to Bryan Elementary yesterday. One of the fifth grade teachers and I are starting a Guys Read group at the school. Guys Read is a website that was started by author Jon Scieszka. There are Guys Read groups all over the nation, and we are starting one here in town. Every two weeks we will be meeting to discuss books that other guys will also enjoy.

Back on Monday, I had my monthly Ka-Boom Science Experiments program. This is something I’ll be doing every month on the second Monday from 4-5pm. This month, we did water experiments. Since our Summer Reading theme were water related, I figured that a water experiments were appropriate to start the fall as well. We got a chance to talk about density, the freezing temperature of water, and how boats float.

For the rest of the week, I was working on a promotional video for our Airband Awesomeness competition on October 22 from 7-9pm. Last Friday, Karen, Cassie, Connie, Emily and I got together to do some filming. It took us about two hours, and we were having way too much fun! You can watch the video on Facebook here. Hope you like it, and I hope you’ll join us for Airband Awesomeness on the 22nd.

In November, there is going to be a youth services conference put on by the Idaho Commission for Libraires, and I’ve been asked to present! I’m supposed to talk about teen services and ways to promote it. Now, I’m still working on better ways to get the word out about my programs, and I don’t think that I’m ever going to be an expert on it. But, I’m really honored to be asked to share my ideas with other librarians.

Hope to see you tonight or next week. Take care!

Library Awesomeness!

Sorry about being a couple days late. This weekend ran away from me. But, there is plenty to talk about, so here is your weekly update on Monday.

Last weekend I was chillin’ with my friends at Triple Play, and a little girl came up and gave me a bear hug. For a split second I was wondering who she could be, and then her mom gave me some context as she said something to the effect of “It must be library time.” This little girl had seen me at one of the library programs and decided to give me a hug even though we weren’t at the library. I love my job!

Another cool thing that happened this week was the Idaho Library Association’s Annual Conference. There were two amazing aspects to this conference for me. First, I got to attend a SPLAT unconference. SPLAT stands for Special Project Library Action Team. Many of the techno savvy librarians in Idaho are a part of this group, and I got to spend the morning and afternoon on Wednesday just gleaning from their knowledge and ideas. I now have plenty of websites and things to look up.

During lunch at the conference I got the pleasure of hearing Chris Crutcher speak. Chris is a well known author whose books often find themselves on banned book lists. Although I’m still wondering where I sit on having some kinds of questionable content in books, hearing Chris’s take on book banning was very interesting and worthwhile. He talked about finding the truth in a story, and bringing that across in his books. Chris was an excellent speaker, and hearing someone else’s take on intellectual freedom is always interesting.

Looking back over the week I’m realizing that I had an even busier week then I thought I did. On Thursday, I got the pleasure of going to Bryan Elementary and awarding kids their summer reading prizes. Bryan set up a special program called the Bear Necessities where kids could get prizes for reading books during the summer. The Hayden Library was one of the biggest sponsors for the program, so Bryan invited us to be a part of the award ceremony. Seeing kids get excited about a free book, and a room full of parents, teachers, and students cheering for reading was a very rewarding experience.

Lastly, the youth services staff and I filmed a promo video for our Airband Awesomeness competition, which is on October 22 from 7:00-9:00. We took “Vacation” by the Go-Gos, grabbed our blow up guitars and Curious George rulers and rocked for a good two hours! The video should be up soon, and it is going to be amazing!

Looking toward this Friday, Alysun Sanders will be joining us from 6:30-7:30. As I’ve mentioned before, she will be discussing writing, being an author, and getting published. Snacks will be provided, and Alysun is really excited to talk to all of you!

Hope you can join us on Friday, and I’ll talk to you guys later.

Sponge or a duck?

Well, how did this week find you? Busy, excited, a little under the weather, upset, annoyed? A few months back, the Hayden Library had a customer service workshop taught by Kate Laughlin, who also taught the Intellectual Freedom workshop that I told you about. She talked about how we had a choice to be a sponge, or a duck. We could either let all of the problems and complications really get to us, or we could let them roll off of our back. I like this reminder to have a positive attitude even when things don’t go the way you want them to, or when it isn’t the best week.

Speaking of having a positive attitude, something that could either be annoying or hilarious happened yesterday. Karen Yother and I took the library van to get some stuff from storage. The Hayden Library has two vans that it owns, and our director, John Hartung, had the newer one. Not a huge problem; the old one still runs. The problem was that the old van is used for recycling, and the entire storage space was filled to the top with cardboard boxes. Needless to say, we needed to take a trip to the dump to free up some van space. Once we headed through the dump, we drove over to our storage unit. Like most storage places, you need a code to get in, and it turns out that our code didn’t work. You could normally go up to the office and they could get you in, but the storage people were out for lunch. Turns out that the bill hadn’t gone through yet, and the system automatically starts locking people out of their accounts if the bill doesn’t go through. Obviously, it could be a very sponge or duck kind of choice. This situation could either be seen as a huge waste of time, or we could look at the bright side and think how this could very easily be used in a slapstick skit.

Yesterday also included driving to Hayden Meadows and Dalton Elementary, so I got to spend a lot of quality time with our Library Van. At the beginning of every summer, we always have some free giveaway stuff that we get from the Collaborative Summer Library Program. Although we didn’t do summer reading promotion at these schools like we did with Fernan or Bryan, we got them the free stuff and some information on when programs were going to be held.

Going back to the beginning of the week, I heard about a resource that I haven’t been utilizing. It’s called Bookletters. Bookletters is an online service with thousands of pages of information on books, films, and authors. You can also set up a customized subscription email, or choose from the long list of subscriptions that come out through Bookletters. You can also set up an event calendar. Basically it’s a database on new and old books, which include synopsizes, author and book information and a lot more. Bookletters can be accessed from our ksalibraries website. Although I don’t have a YA specific newsletter and event calendar set up, I’ll be working on it, and getting back to you in a few weeks.

A few more things to mention. I have my first Book Blurt book review, which I posted on Wednesday. This week’s was about Jerry Spinelli’s Stargirl, and next week’s is going to be on Ingrid Lee’s Dog Lost.

In other news, this week is going to be the start of our summer programs. Our older teen programs aren’t until the third week of the month, but we have plenty going on for tweens (basically our middle schoolers, so around grades 6-8 even though we won’t be too precise) this week. On Monday, we have Ka-Boom science experiments. On Tuesday, we have Lightning Comics teaching us how to play Yu-Gi-Oh, and on Friday, we have our Open Game Friday where we’ll set up our Wii and have some fun.

Well that about wraps up this week, so I’ll see you on Wednesday, and always remember to be a duck.

Splashing through the Schools

Good morning and happy Friday again.

Once again, I love irony. This last week has been one rainy or cloudy day after the other, and of course this is the week that we are promoting summer reading. As I’ve mentioned before, our summer reading themes for all of our age ranges are water related. To get the kids interested in our programs, I decided that I would look as ridiculous as possible, and hopefully the kids would remember the weird tall librarian that came in to promote summer reading. Toward this end, I was wearing my flip flops and swimming trunks, and I and a lovely assistant did a skit for the kids. I mentioned some specific programs that were coming up, and then my assistant dumped a bunch of water on me. After inquiring why I had splashed, my assistant told me that I had said the summer reading theme was “make a splash at your librarian.” I would then clear up the mistake saying that the theme was, “make a splash at your library,” not your librarian. Hopefully a little bit of water goes a long way in getting kids interested in our fun programs throughout the summer.

So we promoted summer reading through the skit to Bryan and Fernan Elementary, and this morning we promoted summer reading to the Title 1 program at Skyway Elementary. The Title 1 teacher set up a “Reading Café,” and invited all of the parents and children in the Title 1 program to enjoy some breakfast. After a book was read, Karen Yother and I talked a little bit about our summer programs, and handed out some free books.

Going back a little bit in the week, I attended a Webjunction Idaho workshop. Webjunction is a network of librarians from every state in the union, and Webjunction Idaho is a specific network within this network. This network was created, obviously through the internet, to share resources and get librarians connected. It is a separate entity from OCLC, the Online Computer Library Center, but is also closely related to OCLC. The workshop included some basic information on setting up an account, and then concluded with letting us explore some of the great content on the site.

Another exciting meeting during my week was getting the chance to talk to the middle and high school librarians. Jean Bengfort is the technology director for the CDA school district, and she meets with the school librarians every month. Jean was talking to John Hartung, our library director, and mentioned that she’d love to see what we were doing during the summer. Tuesday was their monthly meeting, so I popped in and handed out some information on what was going on. Thank you to the school librarians from Lake City High School, Coeur d' Alene High School, Woodland Middle School, Canfield Middle School, and thank you Jean.

There was something else I wanted to mention before I tell you what programs we have coming up, but I couldn’t put my finger on it until right now. This week was a short work week for me because of Memorial Day. Let us never forget those that fell so that we may stand.

That pretty much wraps up this week, except to say look up my blog post about, “Book Blurt” that I posted yesterday, and stop on by for Open Game Day this Friday. Open Game Day is just a really informal hang out time for tweens and teens to play video or board games and goes from 10:30 to noon every Friday during the summer. Check out my book review on Wednesday, and I’ll see you on Friday!

Where did last week go?

Well my last blog post ended talking about my crazy week that wasn’t quite over, so I figured I’d tell you how my last week ended.

Just after writing my blog post I went over to Mountain States Early Head Start. Karen Yother has a day care that comes in once a month, and this time Head Start was at the same time. Although Karen would like to, she can’t be in two places at once, so off I went to Head Start. Obviously Head Start isn’t in my target audience of middle and high schoolers, but I still enjoy playing puppets with toddlers. We went over some colors, animal sounds, sang some songs; it was good.

Right after Head Start I jumped into our library van with some other staff members and drove over to Gonzaga University for INCOL’s spring workshop. Inland Northwest Council of Libraries (INCOL) does two workshops a year, and this workshop was on “Intellectual Freedom.” We had about thirty librarians discussing the Library Bill of Rights, Censorship, Freedom of Speech, Intellectual Freedom, the First Amendment, and obviously Intellectual Freedom. Once we got these overarching documents and principles, we got into the nitty-gritty of how these principles apply to libraries and librarians. As the Library Bill of Rights says, “materials should not be excluded because of the origin, background, or views of those contributing to their creation,” and “libraries should provide materials and information presenting all points of view on current and historical issues.”

Well that was Friday, and the next day we had our award night for our Teen Film Festival that started back during Teen Tech Week 2009. Of our six entries, Ryan took first place with “Earth in Focus,” Josh and Daniel took second with, “We are the Earth,” and Matt took third with, “Life.” Congratulations again to our winners, and thanks to everyone who submitted an entry.

Well I’m already half way through my blog post, and I still haven’t talked about this week yet. My week started meeting with the Coeur d’ Alene School of Woodworking. One of our tween summer reading programs is going to be making wooden boats, and the shop said they would donate wood and materials for our program. Thank you to the CDA School of Woodworking.

I had my second meeting with the Teen Read Week Coordinating Committee. We talked about promoting Teen Read Week, and there were some really fun ideas that might get funded through the state. Stay tuned as October gets closer. Although I’m still new to the idea of meeting through the internet, I think its pretty slick that people from different time zones and from every area of Idaho can speak directly to each other through a pair of headphones and a microphone. Good stuff.

Two more quick things to mention. First, summer reading registration is coming up June 1 for all ages. So stop by the Hayden Library, or register online at ksalibraries.org.

Secondly, I’m going to be adding some new content to the blog every Wednesday, so be looking for my announcement.

Hope you all have a great week, and I’ll see you on Wednesday.