Making Lemonade Out of Lemons - Part 2

Image by Rachel C from Pixabay

Our guest blogger again today is Stacey Brown, Young Adult and Adult Services Librarian at the Augusta (WI) Public Library.  In Part 1, Stacey shared the background on how the group of IFLS teen librarians got together to pool their energy and ideas for shared virtual teen programs. Here she shares more details on how it all works!

Making Lemonade Out of Lemons:  an opportunity from the pandemic - Part 2

The teen events have a variety of themes: cultural holidays, gaming and ‘adulting’, as well as exploring several types of art from music to photography.  Each event lasts about 2 hours divided into 15-30 minute segments so that each librarian has a chance to lead an activity.  For the events, we create grab bags with snacks and crafting supplies that teens pick up at their own library.  This makes it easier for them to participate since they really seem to enjoy making crafts.  One of our best attended events was when we created graham cracker cottages and made various crafts that they were able to give as gifts.  After our cooking demo, we received an email from a mom who said her son enjoyed our program so much that he made crepes for his family the next day!

An unexpected effect of the collaboration was how teens from different communities across Wisconsin got to know one another. They enjoy sharing their common interests, especially a love of reading! At one of our events, a teen asked if we could take a field trip to visit all the libraries in person.  We weren't quite sure how to work out the logistics of this - and still aren’t.  This would be a fun adventure, not only for the teens but also the library staff, most of whom have never met in person before our collaboration.

With the school year coming to an end, we are reassessing the need to continue our collaboration.  Some of the libraries are planning in-person programs this summer and don’t feel able to collaborate but hope to resume in the fall.  Others are planning virtual events this summer and will continue to share and collaborate.  

It has definitely been a learning process, and we’ve had more than a few things to figure out. For starters, we found out that 1-2 hours is plenty of time for this type of programming; if it goes too long, we tend to lose people.  We’ve also had to set registration deadlines. Often, teens will wait until the last minute to register then we end up scrambling to make another grab bag for them.  It’s important to keep in contact so that ideas and suggestions can be addressed when they come up.  The larger the collaborative group, the more difficult it can be to find a time that works for everyone to attend a meeting. I think about 3-5 librarians in a group is ideal.  

During the process of collaboration, we have learned a lot about ourselves and the teens that we serve.  For some of us, we didn’t have teens from our own communities that participated, but we nevertheless had the opportunity to engage with teens and contribute meaningful interactions and activities for them.  Many times after our sessions ended, the librarians stayed on Zoom and shared our struggles and offered each other encouragement and support. 

As librarians, we can all relate to the unusual circumstances and challenges of 2020-2021.  Even with these strange times, we have found new opportunities and solutions that will impact our future programming decisions.  The hope is to host hybrid programs, to reach out to those who can attend in-person and those who feel more comfortable participating virtually.  The pandemic forced us to look outside the box for new opportunities and gave us the initiative and interest for collaborative programming.  I think it’s safe to say that we are all grateful for the opportunities and new friends we have made because of challenges faced together.  We have learned to make lemonade out of lemons.

[YSS Blog Note: A special thanks to IFLS System Youth Consultant Leah Langby for sharing the news about this collaboration with us so we could reach out for this article!]

Making Lemonade Out of Lemons - Part 1

Image by Rachel C from Pixabay

Our guest blogger is Stacey Brown, Young Adult and Adult Services Librarian at the Augusta (WI) Public Library. She and her IFLS colleagues discovered great success when they teamed up to provide teen virtual programs.

Making Lemonade Out of Lemons:  an opportunity from the pandemic - Part 1

All of us have experienced various challenges in 2020-21 due to the pandemic. One challenge for librarians has been how to stay connected to teens when the library is closed. For those of us who plan teen programs this has been even more difficult due to slow or no internet access or parents that only permit teens to use the computer for school work.  For many teens isolation from their friends and being unable to spend time in connection with their peers are huge issues. 

Last summer, I participated in the virtual National Teen Lock-in with two teens from my community.  It was there that I saw the amazing ways that librarians connected with teens via Zoom.  This virtual event included games, activities and crafts led by librarians from across the country. Both of the teens from my community enjoyed the experience so much that they asked if we can do something like this again.  This planted the seed in my mind.

Later during one of the weekly virtual check-in sessions led by Leah Langby at IFLS, I shared with other YA librarians about the experience.  I asked if anyone would be interested in collaborating to plan monthly virtual teen events.  I created a survey which I sent out to the YA librarians in IFLS to see who might be willing to help me plan a collaborative virtual teen event.

In the fall of 2020, a group of YA librarians formed a collaboration: Stacey Brown (Augusta), Valerie Spooner (Ladysmith), Caroline Herfindahl (Ellsworth), Cindy Koller (Park Falls), Claire Parrish (Rice Lake) and in January 2021, Jenna Giles-Turner (Chippewa Falls) joined us.  Each of us had been struggling with teen programming, since we couldn’t meet with teens.  Initially, we filled out surveys to share our abilities and interests to determine who would fill the various roles in coordinating the monthly teen events.  We utilized several tools: a Google drive folder for our ideas and resources, spreadsheets to keep track of the registrations and attendance, Zoom for monthly planning meetings, and exchanged group emails. 

Each month we rotate our duties so that each librarian has an opportunity to host events, this includes creating flyers and Facebook events.  The host records the attendance for that month’s event, determines the theme, pays for presenters and creates the schedule of activities for the program.  During the registration process the host notifies the team which students have registered at each library.  Each librarian shares various talents and ideas so that the events aren’t planned by just one person. 

Please stop by the blog tomorrow to read Part 2 of Stacey's post.

Common Core Standards

As librarians, it is important for us to acknowledge shifts in education standards and how they might affect the way students find and engage with information at the library.  The Common Core State Standards Initiative has become a large part of the education realm, meaning that as librarians, we should have a solid understanding of the standards.
A wonderful resource for understanding Common Core is corestandards.org.  The site allows you to explore the standards from a basic walk-through of the highlights to an in-depth reading.  A great tool for building non-fiction and fiction collections that will complement the work being done in schools!