Last week Marianne from Audubon Ark came to the library and ran a program on Habitats, with featured guests Painted Turtle and Skunk.  As expected, the program was terrific.  (For those of you who are children’s librarians in Massachusetts, if you haven’t had an Audubon Ark program at your library, you should: they are of the highest quality AND they are affordable.)

Marianne is a great teacher naturalist, and I was really impressed by her ability to both present information and listen to the kids.  She took her time, and allowed each child who wanted to speak to do so at his or her own speed.  When a child was finished commenting or asking a question, Marianne was able to be spontaneous and adapt her presentation to accomodate the specific interests of the kids in attendance. 

As with last summer’s Birds of Prey program, I was also very impressed by the matter-of-fact nature of these Audubon Ark programs.  The teacher naturalists cover all aspects of the animals that they have brought with them, from birth to death to reproduction.  Skulls of dead animals (in this case, a skunk) are shown to the kids, skins and shells are passed around for the kids to examine (at this program, two painted turtle shells and a skunk pelt were shared), and questions about reproduction are handled without drama (Marianne explained that you can tell a female painted turtle from a male by the shape of the turtle’s belly: a female’s belly is flat, a male’s is concave so that the male can mate with the female).  This last point is particularly of interest to me, since Marianne addressed that delicate subject of mating without raising a single parental eyebrow.  She didn’t ignore the issue, yet she also didn’t dwell upon it.  Mating exists, she mentioned it, done, move on.  Death exists, too, as evidenced by the skulls and pelts, but is handled in such a way that kids aren’t grossed out (or freaked out) by it. 

Obviously, Marianne was fabulous, and I hope that she is able to run our August program on Backyard Wildlife.  But the real star of last week was the skunk.  Mr. Skunk was one cool dude, as he wandered around his plexi-glass corral and snuffled through the leaves in search of his cat kibbles.  The kids got to sit in a ring around the corral, right up next to the skunk, but the skunk could have cared less about the circle of small faces surrounding him.  He’s obviously used to life in the public eye, and his primary objective was to find his afternoon snack. 

My thanks to Marianne, the turtle, and the skunk for a great afternoon.  I can’t wait until August’s program and the visit from the opossum!!

So, it’s my third summer as a children’s librarian, and my second summer running a summer reading program from the new library building.  And I’ll probably jinx myself by putting this in type…but so far this summer has been very pleasant.  Very pleasant.  It’s a combination of me feeling at ease with the massive amount of work involved in running a summer reading program, and the patrons’ ease with me and with the changes that I made to the summer reading system.

Now that I’m not thoroughly weighed down by the summer tasks, I’m able to really enjoy the different pace of summer in a library.  I love getting to talk to each child who comes in to “cash” in their reading hours, and I love that entering the childrens’ hours in the computer allows me to get a handle on each child’s name.  I love the stories that parents tell me about what a difference the summer incentives have made in the reading habits of their child.  I love the fantastic performers who are coming to the library, and that the generous support of the Friends of the library allows us to provide great programming for free.  I love the squeals of delight when I call kids to let them know that they’re a raffle winner.   And I really love that the collection in the children’s room is brimming with new wonderful books that are inspiring kids to read.  It’s really incredibly awesome to be at the center of all this activity, and to be mellow enough to enjoy it. 

I wonder what the fourth summer will be like?

“Habitats: Animals and their Environments,” presented by Audubon Ark from Drumlin Farm.  Two sessions, one at 2:30 and one at 3:15, and there’s still a bit of room left in each.  The naturalist teacher will be bringing a skunk and a painted turtle, and if last year’s Birds of Prey program is an indication, this should be a terrific educational event.