Tis the Season to Give!

With the holidays comes a need to give to others, whether giving "back" or simply out of the goodness of your heart. Either way, Carrie and I had a great opportunity to do so last week.

Two weeks ago, a parent of a Pre-K kid and a 1st grader came to introduce herself. She works for Uplift, a local charter school initiative to provide quality, college-prepatory education to students around DFW. The Uplift program is expanding greatly and they are just now creating library spaces for some of the high schools. Mrs. B asked if she could bring some folks from Uplift to see what a library should look like, get ideas from our program, databases, etc.

We were more than happy to help. Last week, Mrs. B, plus a librarian who volunteers with Uplift, a Learning Specialist, and High School teacher all came to visit with Carrie and me. We were able to show them our space and how certain areas are designated for specific grades. Later, we had them sit on the story steps and showed them our catalog, eBook collection, and databases. I even showed the Learning Specialist how to cover books with a CoLibri machine!

 It was great to hear their questions and be able to provide some help and support. I could not imagine starting a library from scratch, as fun and daunting as it sounds. the librarian volunteer told us that many of the schools do not even have a certified librarian. They are simply trying to get the space ready for the kids to utilize. How exciting is that new adventure for them? I'm glad we could help them, even if it was only a smidge.

There's been a lot going on in our library. We've had Grandparents and Special Friends Day before Thanksgiving, and the Christmas break and winter holidays have creeped upon us yet again. Thankfully people have been wonderful to give to us and we are able to give back through many ways. We help kids create memories, friends, and learn more about themselves through books we order and recommend. Carrie and I volunteer to help out other teachers whenever it is possible. We helped several libraries outside of our network in order to help even more kids in our community.

Wow!

Every day is a chance to give. In the library setting such as ours, we give through our interactions and attitudes with others. I am working on my own and am aiming for a very positive 2015.

Subbing Day

It's always fun when I get to sub for Carrie. There's usually a lot to be done that keeps me busy and that's precisely how I enjoy it. Today is a bit wacky as we have six classes but its nothing I haven't done before.

So far, this has been the schedule:
3rd grade: iPad rules
4th grade: catching up on Bluebonnet stuff (writing summaries, checking books off the list, etc.)
Primer: Hanukkah lessons

The rest of the day will look like:

2nd grade: quiet reading and finding good fit books
Pre-K: 3 Little Pigs
1st grade: continuing catalog overview

Now that the heater has finally been turned on, I feel as though I might pass out...great. Can't win when you're sick and dealing with kids.

Here's hoping the rest of the day goes well.

'Tis the Season to Be Busy!

Author's Note:
I earnestly meant for the post to be, er, posted quite a while ago. Sickness, group projects, and Thanksgiving threw me off completely. Here it is, only edited for certain time periods.

                                                                                                                                                                                                 

This time of year can be crazy. Trying to cram in things before the holidays, like book orders and certain lessons, or just general housekeeping of the library space. In my personal life, its homework on top of homework while my husband is diligently working on the Christmas production for his job. Needless to say, I feel a bit frazzled at times and am ready for a week of rest. It's not to say that I don't enjoy my work, its that I am just plum tired.

Last week a few weeks ago, I started off the busyness with taking a couple of workshops through Region 10. Region 10 offers professional education courses to teachers, librarians, and other people that work in a school environment (like me!). Friday was a session regarding Lego Story Creator sets. We only spent about 45 minutes there discussing how to use the Story Creator set and making different stories in groups. Our presenter Betty Justus (doesn't that sound like a super hero name?) gave us all trinkets and a Lego pigeon to take home!

You jelly?

The next day was a full day workshop for Makerspace Magic. The presenters were from Arlington ISD and were so awesome! I felt that the session was a bit long, especially with an hour and a half for lunch. The first half of the day, we reviewed websites for maker spaces in various types of schools. Obviously not all of them would work at an elementary level, nor would they work in an independent school like we are. It was fascinating to see different set ups, though.

The second half of the morning covered the ins and outs of securing the space, how to get funding (can independent schools get grants?), and what to do that would be appropriate for certain age groups. That was the best part of the entire day, even though we got to play with a bunch of different stations.There's all kinds of creative stuff to be done. I guess my homeschool upbringing was good for something! Having helped my mom pick out my own curriculum, what crafts I wanted to do, and all that stuff, I guess I have been exposed to more crafts than any one person should ever be.

I love it.

So now it is the post Thanksgiving rush, into the Christmas/holiday rush where decorations must be taken care of post haste. Ours in the library are looking pretty pathetic right now. Maybe when this stomach bug passes and I have a free evening, I can take care of it. Poinsettias sound pretty nice and quick to me.

Here's to a stress-reduced December...ha!

Christine