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.