Battle of the Books, Children's Room, Terrific Tots Storytime, Archive project, YA Book discussion

9:00 am - 2:00 pm
& 4:00 pm -5:00 pm
6 hours
Total hours to date: 58

I started out today sitting in on a meeting with Alicia and A. Bradshaw, the Media Director for the local school system. Since I taught literally next-door to her for a number of years, it was nice to see her again. She was meeting with Alicia to review rules and procedures for the upcoming middle school reading competition--Battle of the Books, in which Alicia will be a judge. It was an interesting meeting to me, because I have been a teacher so competitions like this are familiar to me, but I have not been involved in Battle of the Books. Alicia asked if I could come, so I am going to try to attend. It is a unique opportunity to blend my experiences and training in both school and public librarian roles. Battle of the Books is similar to a quiz bowl, except each school's team reads and studies from a list of 18 books on the BoB list. Media Coordinators from each school coach their teams. It should be fun!

I helped to shelve books in the children's room and check-in/out during the busy times before and after Toddler story-time. I was also able to peek in during the toddler story-time craft and interact with some of the children and parents. I think toddler story-time is just as much for the parents as it is for the children. The parents get an opportunity to catch up and converse with other parents and the kids have a fun time in a social setting while they are learning about the library and enjoying books.

Then, at around lunchtime, I went upstairs to the NC room to continue working on the archive project with Gale. I finished documenting and labeling three archive-safe boxes of artifacts. Also, I was able to document the characteristics of a very interesting WWI scrapbook of newspaper articles from 1918-1919. This scrapbook must have been a labor of interest for a local woman as she carefully clipped various articles from the Charlotte newspaper of the day, with each article documenting something about the war.

I reflected, as I was leaving the library today, that I really do enjoy every aspect of my work in the library so far. I enjoy working with the adults and the many senior citizens who frequent the library. I enjoy helping people find things and use the computers. I enjoy working in the NC room with research, genealogy, local history, and archiving. I also love working with the children. One of the areas where I haven't had much involvement so far is in acquisitions with Karen, but I will work with her next week. I am excited to learn how she processes, repairs, and distributes materials for the library and I am also eager to help her because she has so much to do. Also, I haven't dealt much with Paige, who teaches computer classes for the adults. I'm not sure what other responsibilities she has, so I hope to learn more about her job as well. I want to get involved more with all the different programming areas and sit in on more of the programs.

This afternoon, I also attended the YA book discussion for The Hunger Games at CB Hildebrand branch of the library. I had never been to that branch, so it was very interesting to see that satellite of the BCPLS. Although it is small, there's a little bit of everything, from computers, to YA, adult, and children's books, so I think it is a wonderful and convenient resource for the people of that community. Because it is small, the book discussion was held at a long conference table in the large room; there was not a separate room, so there was a little bit of distraction from other patrons who were in the library at the time. There were ten young adults in attendance, and Alicia led a discussion about The Hunger Games. It was a book that the young adults seem to really enjoy, although it did take them a few questions in the beginning to warm up before all of them really began contributing. I think Alicia kept the tone very fun and interesting, balancing the thoughtful questions with more light-hearted ones. I found it difficult to observe with getting involved too much, and I realized that I was having to suppress the teacher in me who wanted to get in "teacher mode." These YA discussions should be a chance for the young adults to explore their thoughts on the book without academic pressure, so the mood should reflect that purpose. All in all, I think it was a busy but productive day.