WEMTA Conference Registration is Open!

The WEMTA March 22-24th 2020 Conference attendee registration is OPEN!

Please go to https://tinyurl.com/20wemtareg for the registration directions and to register.

Early-bird discounts will end January 15th, 2020 so register today!

Helping Those with Colorblindness See the Rainbow

EnChroma has developed a pair of special glasses that allow people who are colorblind see the full spectrum of color.  This blog post describing how the Denver Museum of Contemporay Art makes glasses available to its patrons might suggest to us a possibility for libraries!

Pilot Sites Announced for Reimagining School Readiness IMLS Project

Four WI libraries have been announced as pilot sites to use the new Reimagining School Readiness Toolkit with their community families. The feedback received from this use will guide changes to the existing Toolkit.

The libraries selected:  
Lester Library in Two Rivers (Terry Ehle, site lead); Mead Public Library in Sheboygan (Alison Loewen, site lead); Monticello Public Library (Krystal Watkins, site lead); and Plum Lake Public Library in Sayner (Emilie Braunel, site lead). These locations were selected through a competitive application process stemming from the October 24th, 2019 Reimagining School Readiness training hosted by the Department of Public Instruction (DPI). A total of 12 pilot sites were selected nationally. DPI is a partner state in the Reimagining School Readiness Project.

Stop here to read the full blog post with all the details of this exciting project shared by Tessa Michaelson Schmidt.

Throw-It Thursday: Happy Weeding! (I mean Holidays!)

This holiday season let’s take some time to look at our holiday books. Books about special days like Christmas, Easter, and Halloween usually have those holiday books flying off of the shelves! But what if there’s a Thanksgiving book that no one decided to check out this year? Throw it! Make room for some of those new, brightly illustrated titles! One of the best ways to do this is to pull out all of your books about the upcoming holiday and put them in a display. When the holiday is over, take all of the books still on the display and look at their circulation stats. If they were not checked out during the current holiday season, maybe it’s time to replace them with a nice clean copy, or just remove them from the collection altogether. I mean, come on, if no one checked out that Christmas book during November or December, why are you holding on to it?! That’s some primo shelf space that book is taking up!

And while you’re at it, head into your non-fiction collections. Find those holiday, cooking, and crafting books and take a look at what old, crusty holiday books you have hiding there too! Remember, if the pictures are old and a book easily looks like it is from another decade, it can probably get tossed. Find some fresh, new holiday books to spruce up your collection! Unless you’re one of those people who thinks all books should be loved and cherished forever. Then by all means, let your library shelves overfloweth; turn those stacks into a maze of books where no one can find anything because there’s too much of everything.

Happy Holidays - I mean weeding! - Ashley Borman, Technical Services Librarian, Clintonville Public Library

Public libraries ditch fines to fight inequality

Emma Bowman writes: “For decades, libraries have relied on fines to discourage patrons from returning books late. But a growing number of some of the country's biggest public library systems are ditching overdue fees after finding that the penalties drive away the people who stand to benefit the most from free library resources. From San Diego to Chicago to Boston, public libraries that have analyzed the effects of late fees on their cardholders have found that they disproportionately deter low-income residents and children.”...

Read more HERE. 

ICYMI: An Ordinary People Change the World-Inspired TV Series, Now on PBS!

Xavier Riddle and the Secret Museum, inspired by the book series Ordinary People Change the World, is one of the newest offerings on PBS. 

(What's that?  Did someone say DISPLAY OPPORTUNITY?!)

The series tells the ongoing story of three children who, with the help of historical heroes, learn to overcome problems and discover that the power to be a hero--whether on a grand scale or a smaller one--resides in all of us. 

"Xavier Riddle fits that concept into an encompassing story with recurring characters. In each episode, Xavier, his sister Yadina, and their friend Brad encounter some sort of problem. To resolve their issue, they visit a secret museum, where a robot curator named Berby sends them back in time to meet a historical figure whose example will help them with their problem."

"The goal of the series is for kids to understand that they have the power within themselves to be heroes,” Eliopoulos says. “We all have these qualities that these historical figures had. They just use those qualities at the right moment. And that’s why we have them as kids. They’re not grand statues. Abraham Lincoln was once a kid who probably did the same things kids today do: he probably skipped rocks in a pond, just like you. So we’re hoping that kids can relate to these heroes and see that that’s inside them, too."

Click HERE to read more from Christopher Eliopoulos, illustrator for both the book series AND the show!

Get to Know Your YSS Webpage - Part 7

This is the final Monday post in our series to familiarize you with the Youth Services Section's (YSS) webpage. Hosted as part of the Wisconsin Library Association website, the webpage has a host of helpful resources free to anyone (although if you aren't a member we hope you'll join to help us continue our work!). And now we present....

Knock-Knock - The YSS Homepage Address
While we have done alot of direct linking to resources over the past few weeks, you actually may not have landed on the YSS webpage itself. So we want to show you where we are on the WLA website. It's our holiday present to you!

First go to the WLA homepage

Click on "Section" for a dropdown menu

Click on "Youth Services"

and voila! You have arrived at the YSS webpage address aka http://wla.wisconsinlibraries.org/yss

Happy holidays!

Click these links to find more YSS resource blog posts (as they are published weekly)
Part 1 -  Free CE- Archived YSS Webinars
Part 2 - Teen Power - 52 Weeks of YA Programming
Part 3 - In a Minute! YSS Board Meeting Notes
Part 4 - Coding Power - 12 Months of Coding Resources
Part 5 -  Bravo - Children's Books Awards Committee/Burr Worzalla Award
Part 6 - Follow the Leaders - The YSS Board

And don't forget to visit the main WLA website for news and updates of conferences and other opportunities.

Guest Post: Letters to Santa Program

Guest Post: Katelyn Noack, Mondovi Public Library

What is the program?

Pretty straightforward, it is about having kids (or anyone) write a letter to Santa! Only, Librarian’s KNOW Santa and have been promised that every child will receive a personal response from the North Pole. Pretty cool.

How did you come up with it?

A few years ago, I learned that the United States Postal Service (USPS) does a pretty cool thing where you can mail Santa letters ‘to the North Pole’ AKA Alaska, and the post office will postmark them from the North Pole and mail them back. So instead of your letter having a beautiful stamp saying it was processed in St. Paul (or wherever) it came FROM the North Pole. I wanted to take advantage of this program because I knew it would basically only cost me postage. For all the mailing information please see the link to the USPS website. It includes where to mail the letters and HOW to mail the letters.

https://about.usps.com/holidaynews/letters-from-santa.htm

Quick Background on Previous Years

I have done Letters to Santa for about three years now. The first time it was done directly after Story Time and I mainly had a bunch of blank papers with foam stickers and crayon on it. Live and learn. Then the next year I have Letters to Santa as an all-day drop in station. I designed some fun paper for the attendees to write on and left out instructions. It went well and we had about 30 letters turned in (large for our town!). However, after the program I received feedback from a few participants that it didn’t feel very “special” or “magical” that they were by themselves writing these letters. I took that to heart and made the program more of an event this year, versus a “drop-in”.

What I Did This Year:

First off, I designed a form fill letter instead of a blank sheet. I had a hard time crafting individual responses to an orange crayon squiggle. I also created an optional blank page that could be attached to the letter if the attendee wanted to write more or draw a picture. I also created envelopes to match the letters. I designed everything on Canva and only had to purchase some blank envelopes (no letterhead). Pro Tip: For your responses, unless you LOVE the taste of envelopes, save yourself and get pull seal ones. Trust me. I also created a USPS mailbox out of a Baker and Taylor shipping box for the attendees to put their letters in to “mail them”.  (Blue paint and a hot glue gun)

To make it more “magical” and interactive I had a few other stations as well. There was a snack station and a craft station. For the snack station I made Jell-O jigglers (gluten free, dairy free, nut free, etc. free) out of green and red Jell-O and for the craft station I had the kids make stockings. I made a template and we printed out a bunch on white cardstock and the same number on red cardstock. Before the program the staff cut out all the stockings and they were paired up. The white when on top of the red and they were hole punched all around. Then for the craft attendees decorated the white stocking with crayons, and festive foam stickers. When they were done, they could “sew” their stocking together with yarn – yay for fine motor skills!

Finally, as our last piece of “magic” we had a special visitor come who was going to take the letters back to the North Pole with her! One of our Friends had an elf costume and volunteered to be at the event. It was a wonderful highlight (even if some of the itty-bittys got scared by the costume).

How did it go?

Unfortunately, it did not go well. We had about three families come, and a total of 7 letters turned in. It was a drastic change from the year before. However, the kids who did come had a bunch of fun!

What went wrong?

Here are a few of my theories:

• It was the time. While the drop-in activity may have been “less magical” it gave families the flexibility to stop by when they could. This event ran from 3 PM to 4:30 PM and didn’t seem to work out for many people.
• It was the week of Thanksgiving. Last year we did the program the first week in December, which worked well but I received feedback that some of the kid’s letters did not return until the day AFTER Christmas. (Hey, Alaska is far away!) So, this year I moved it up a week! But it just so happens that we had a late Thanksgiving and therefore the dates coincided, and the program was the Monday before the Holiday. Many people are too busy around the holidays for much extra and that also make have been a factor in low attendance.

Tips/Notes

• If you want to save your hand, you can have the caregiver write a response to their tiny human or at least make them aware of the option.
• Make sure you have a legible return address! I have three siblings all write a variation of the same return address. Yikes. You could have caregivers pre-address the envelopes too if you wished.
• Supplies were paper (which we had), printing (lot of printing), self-seal envelopes (Amazon – 100 for $9.00),  yarn to stitch stockings (which we already had), foam stickers for decorating (Michaels – with coupon I think it was $2.50 for 150 pieces), Jell-O, and postage. This program is more time than cost.

Where are the printables?! GIMME GIMME
Click HERE for printables from this program

2019 Holiday Gift Guide for Book Lovers

It's that time of year again! Check out this list of gifts for librarians and book lovers alike. Read more HERE.

25 Best Children's Books of 2019 - New York Times Edition!

The New York Times recently revealed its 25 Best Children's Books of 2019!

Click HERE to start exploring!  How many do you have on your shelves?

      

Webinar: Trauma-Informed Education

Using Children’s Books to Approach Trauma-Informed Education was a recent webinar hosted by Lee & Low Books.  The first half of the webinar provides a thoughtful overview of trauma, including important concepts and terminology. The second half dives into specific titles and how they might be used in a classroom setting (which would need to be modified for a public library setting).

You can watch the webinar recording here and check out Lee & Low’s Trauma-Informed Diverse Reading List that showcases child protagonists who cope with trauma in a variety of ways and provide students opportunities to discuss trauma through the lens of a relatable and engaging character.

**Thanks to Amanda Bosky at the Stoughton Public Library who sent this to Tessa and, as always, to Tessa, for sharing so many vital and informative resources with library staff serving youth and families throughout Wisconsin.**

Get to Know Your YSS Website - Part 6

This is one in a series of posts on Mondays to familiarize you with the Youth Services Section's (YSS) webpage. Hosted as part of the Wisconsin Library Association website, the webpage has a host of helpful resources free to anyone (although if you aren't a member we hope you'll join to help us continue our work!). And now we present....

Follow the Leaders - Who is on the YSS Board
Do you ever wonder who is on the YSS board? While you can look to the right on this blog and see them, its also great to know how to reach them all easily and directly.

This link brings you directly to the leaders and their emails on the website (scroll down to the bottom to click on the 2019 and 2020 leaders). It also refers you to WLA office where past leaders from the 1960's up to the present are archived in the WLA dropbox. You can ask to have those leader PDF's sent to you anytime if you want to delve further back than the current year or two.

We hope to see your name on those leadership docs soon. It's a great experience with a great support group to work with!

Check out these other YSS website resource blog posts (will be linked as they are published weekly)
Part 1-  Free CE- Archived YSS Webinars
Part 2 -Teen Power - 52 Weeks of YA Programming
Part 3 - In a Minute! YSS Board Meeting Notes
Part 4 - Coding Power - 12 Months of Coding Resources
Part 5 -  Bravo - Children's Books Awards Committee/Burr Worzalla Award
Part 7 - Knock-Knock - The YSS Homepage Address

And don't forget to visit the main WLA website for news and updates of conferences and other opportunities.

UW-Madison Online CE Classes

Looking to up your game? There are a number of youth services-focused classes offered by UW-Madison iSchool COntinuing Ed Dept. coming in early 2020 perfect for you. Here's the  line-up. Click on the title for class details and description.

Online Classes

Register two weeks before the start date for a 10% discount!

Groups of 5 or more? Contact us about a reduced rate: ahpalmer@wisc.edu

NEW! I’m a School Library Media Specialist… Now What?!

Feb 3 – March 15

Amanda Struckmeyer successfully made the switch from public to school library and has a wealth of experience to share.

Babies in the Library 

Feb 3 – March 15

Join YSS member Brook Newberry sharing all the things on service t babies and their caregivers.

Reinvent Your Summer Library Program

Feb 3 – March 1

YSS member Sue Abrahamson gives practical, do-able tips to create change for your SLP

Solving Copyright Dilemmas for K12 Libraries

Feb 3 – March 1

All you need to know when working with your students

Questions? Contact Anna Palmer

Guest Post: Manitowoc Public Library: Trunk or Treat Family Event!

Guest Post: Julia Lee, Youth Services Manager, Manitowoc Public Library

This past October, Manitowoc Public Library hosted our first-ever Trunk or Treat event! For those who might not know, the premise of a trunk or treat program is to provide a family trick-or-treat experience in a safe, public environment. We started by contacting local organizations in town, such as the Police, Fire Department, Head Start, volunteer organizations, etc. We also reached out to any Scouts or 4-H contacts. I was hoping for 10 organizations to participate our first year – we had 27!!! *HAPPY DANCE*

We held Trunk or Treat in our library parking lot on a Tuesday evening. We normally hold a Family Activity Night with solid participation numbers, so we held it as one of our Family Activity Night programs. Though the weather was unseasonably cold, we had over 1,000 people attend. All the organizations are interested in participating next year – we just need to use a bigger parking lot! Clean-up was a breeze – all the cars pulled out of the lot and drove away.

For those looking for ways to get connected, this was a fantastic community building event! As the event got closer, our Facebook page BLEW UP! While at first I estimated maybe 300 people would attend, we soon had over 1,000 people interested on our Facebook event. In the weeks leading up to Trunk or Treat, I had organizations calling and reaching out to us instead of the other way around, trying to see if they could still participate. Trunk or Treat was easy to plan (mostly just emailing my contacts on a regular basis and setting up an evite), simple to execute, and easy to clean-up.

Notes from the program: This year, I created a vendor map of the parking lot for my staff so we knew where to direct them when they arrived. Next year, I am planning to send the map out ahead of time to my organizations for a smoother check-in process. I also bought extra treats and candy to have on hand in case organizations ran out. This was a GREAT idea, as some organizations ran out of candy in the first 10 minutes of our hour-long program. They were grateful to have something to pass out!

Photo Editing Tips

When I worked at Brewer Public Library we did not have a marketing librarian, so all marketing and outreach was done by library staff. Although it was a huge time investment, we saw real change when librarians began to take photos and submitted them to social media or the local paper. 

If your duties include editing photos as part of your library work, read on. 

J. D. Sartain writes: “You have many choices among photo editing software programs, whether it’s Adobe Photoshop, Corel Painter, Paintshop Pro, or GIMP.net—all of which now have very similar feature sets. These basic photo editing tips will help you work in pretty much any application available. The number one, most important tip I can share with you is this: Never edit your originals. Always make a copy and save that copy as a layered file, if possible, because layers can be adjusted and edited individually.”..

Read more HERE. 

REMINDER: WI Children's Book Award Committee wants YOU!

Hello YSS members!

Are you an adult who loves reading children's and teen books?  Would you like to critically discuss excellent youth books with your peers?  If so, please consider applying for WLA's Children's Book Award Committee (CBAC)!  The CBAC, as a long-standing sub-committee of YSS, annually bestows the Burr/Worzalla Award and Notable Children's Author/Illustrator Award upon Wisconsin's best and brightest book creators.

The CBAC is looking to fill 2 vacant committee seats starting in 2020.  We are seeking a diverse group hailing from all areas of our delightful state.  The committee will meet three times, in person, during the Spring of 2020 to deliberate and decide.  If you are interested, please review the committee duties and submit the following via email to CBAC Chair Aimee Schreiber (a.schreiber@wrlsweb.org):

1. Name, Job Title, Library, and City
2. Are you a current member of WLA and YSS?
3. Please describe your professional library work experience, including any reviewing experience and/or WLA committee work.
4. Please detail your reading preferences, including any areas of special interest.
5. Why should we consider you for a position on this committee?

Applications are due by end of day, Sunday, December 8.  If you have any questions or concerns please don't hesitate to contact Aimee via email.

On, Wisconsin! End-of-Summer Survey Results

Check out the one-page PDF “report card” summarizing the end-of-summer survey:

Want a closer look or to print off a copy of your very own?  Click HERE.

Thanks to Michael Dennison for compiling and arranging this data on behalf of Wisconsin public libraries!

Putting on a Tea-Rex Party

What's better than a tea party? Why a Tea-Rex party complete with royalty and dinosaurs. I talked to Youth Services librarian Tricia Wehrenberg, Youth Services Librarian at the Winona (MN) Public Library (once youth librarian at Amery Library in IFLS) about the fun and this is what they did.

The seed for the program came from Tea REX, Molly Idle's 2013 book. Tricia and Marcia, her library associate, hatched the idea of doing a family evening program that would be attractive for girls and boys and many ages. I mean who doesn't like dinosaurs and royalty?

Kids were invited to wear royal or dinosaur costumes. Fliers, Facebook, telling storytime caregivers and awesome patron word-of-mouth were all that was needed. Kids from tots to early elementary-aged came to enjoy the fun with their families.

On the night of the program, Marcia was the princess host and Tricia was her silent t-Rex partner (the fan in in the costume to keep it inflated prevented talking). The princess began the soiree with a story, Crunch the Shy Dinosaur (Cirocco Dunlap, 2018). Next she knocked at a door and out came the T-Rex to "help," through mime, with the featured Tea Rex book., a hilarious take on tea party etiquette lessons for a dinosaur.

The rollicking fun continued with dinosaur stretches, and songs (I'm a Little Tea Pot) that had the families laughing as the T-rex attempted the actions with those oh-so-tiny T-rex arms. As Tricia said, "I did alot of dancing and tail shaking for sure!"

Activities included a paper hat-making station and dinosaur mask-making with accessories like mustaches and jewels for the royally-inclined. Lemonade was served in plastic cups (with handles to fancy them up) and mini-cupcakes completed the treats.

For more pictures of the party, head to Winona's Facebook page. If you want more info on the party, contact Tricia. Thanks for sharing!

Photos courtesy of Winona Public Library

Get to Know Your YSS Webpage - Part 5

This is one in a series of Monday posts to familiarize you with the Youth Services Section's (YSS) webpage. Hosted as part of the Wisconsin Library Association website, the webpage has a host of helpful resources free to anyone (although if you aren't a member we hope you'll join to help us continue our work!). And now we present....

Bravo - Children's Book Award Committee/Burr Worzalla Award
The Children's Book Award Committee is part of YSS. The YSS chair annually appoints members to the committee (members serve alternating 2 year terms). They award the prestigious Burr Worzalla Award annually - announced in summer and presented at the WLA fall conference. They also select up to ten outstanding books for the year published by Wisconsin authors.

To find out all about the committee and their work, click here.

To explore more about the awards, you can find information about Elizabeth Burr, for whom the award is named; the annual list of notable authors  as well as the annual list of Outstanding Book Awards.

Click these links to find more YSS resource blog posts (as they are published weekly)
Part 1 - Free CE- Archived YSS Webinars
Part 2 - Teen Power - 52 Weeks of YA Programming
Part 3 - In a Minute! YSS Board Meeting Notes
Part 4 - Coding Power - 12 Months of Coding Resources
Part 6 - Follow the Leaders - The YSS Board
Part 7 - Knock-Knock - The YSS Homepage Address

And don't forget to visit the main WLA website for news and updates of conferences and other opportunities.