Category Archives: Children

Children, Spare time - Culture, Teaching

Students

As of last night, I have now reunited with both of my tutoring students from last year.  I still see Z– twice a week, and J– once a week, and we’re still using the Wilson Reading System.

I’m delighted to say that neither student regressed at all over the summer, which shocks me no end.  Usually there is a certain amount of regression, and usually I have to reteach a variety of things, from keywords to spelling rules to syllable definitions.  Not so with these two students!  One review lesson each, mostly for my benefit, to reassure me that there was enough retention to continue on where we had left off.

Both students are very motivated and enjoy learning the structure of the language, which surely helps, but I also think that I’m seeing the tangible benefit of one-on-one after-school tutoring.  When I worked at the elementary school, I usually tutored students in small groups (still quite effective, mind you), and my lessons occurred in the midst of the school day.  My school students always experienced some regression each summer, not a terrible amount, but some.  But weekly one-on-one tutoring in the comfort of the student’s home clearly holds more weight.  I can focus my lessons to be specifically tailored to that one child’s needs, and the child is learning in a safe, distraction-free environment. 

At any rate, I’m thrilled to be working with both of these students again.  They’re both great kids, with great attitudes, and it’s an absolute joy to be working with them. 

Children, Storytime

Burning question

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I’ve been doing lots of studying up on storytimes, and have discovered many great ideas and program plans.  Let me just say that up front: the three books that I’m using to educate myself have a wealth of great information and tips and suggestions, and I have learned an enormous amount.

But these books have also re-raised an issue that has bothered me in the past: the dependence on die-cut machines for library programs.  [I’m bound to offend a large number of people here, but it’s time for me to expose my snarky side…]  As the daughter of an educator who excelled at creative projects, I take issue with the use of pre-cut shapes in storytimes, which the child participants decorate and take home.  Several things bother me: the requirement to take something tangible home after a storytime, which by nature is an intangible event; the importance being placed on the end product at an age (two, three, four years old) when the child’s natural end product is not going to be pleasing to adult eyes; and the removal of exploration from the child’s artistic experience.

Mom used to talk to me about her educational theory.  I specifically remember one conversation with her when we talked about how everything is new to a young child, and that even holding an ice cube and watching it begin to melt is a fascinating educational moment for an infant or toddler.  She also advocated the use of water tables, sand boxes, and other mediums in which a child can become absorbed in the moment, make discoveries, and also mellow out by virtue of water therapy or sand therapy. 

Children have very different artistic sensibilities than adults – they’re freer, less inhibited by cultural standards – and it’s from these differences that new directions in art can be born.  For my first Create a Valentine program, I had an assortment of artistic goodies laid out for the kids, along with a huge stack of pre-cut felt hearts, with the intention that the kids would take the supplies and glue them on to pieces of construction paper and make traditional cards.  It was a shock to me, in a good way, when one girl took a funky lumpy pipe cleaner and strung several of the felt hearts on it, then looped the two ends of the pipe cleaner together to make a circular, three-dimensional, totally non-traditional Valentine. 

The storytime books that I’m reading talk a lot about how librarians running storytimes have a golden opportunity to teach parents and caregivers to present books and reading to their children in a developmentally appropriate way.  We’ve obviously made huge strides in the literacy end of things, and our storytimes have changed to reflect that, depending less upon a weekly theme and more upon stories that encourage and develop pre-reading skills in children.  In my two youngest storytimes, if I choose to include an artistic element, I’d like to make that portion of the storytime be equally appropriate for the attendees.  Why not blow bubbles, or play with clay (no end product needed or intended), or experience water play?  If and when my storytimes have a craft portion, I want it to be experiential, not judgemental.  I don’t want to burden any child at a very early age with the sense that he or she “couldn’t do” the assigned project correctly. 

I’d love to hear other opinions on this matter, maybe even get a discussion going.  Comments, anyone?

Children, Storytime

Storytimes

I fancy myself a bit of an innovator.  It’s probably not true, but it makes me feel good to think of myself as innovative. 

My latest project is the addition of one more weekly storytime, so that the library now offers an Infant Storytime (ages 0 – 2), a Toddler Storytime (ages 2 & 3), and a Preschool Storytime (ages 4 – 7).  The Infant Storytime will continue in much the same vein as the storytime that I offered last year for ages 0 – 3, though I’ll take out some of the longer stories – that would be stories with more than ten words – and add in more bounce rhymes and tickle rhymes.  The Preschool Storytime will give me an opportunity to read some longer books than I could use with the 3 – 5 year-old age grouping of last year, and I’ll also add in some occasional crafts and make use of the collection of puppets that I was able to purchase with the funds donated by one of the preschools in town.  The Toddler Storytime poses a bit more of a challenge, as I try to sort through my repertoire looking for songs and stories that will specifically intrigue those attention-challenged 2 and 3 year olds.

My fear is that I’ll be frantically scrambling each week to come up with a lesson plan for each of these three storytimes, and that the storytimes will be less imaginative and, yes, less innovative, because I’ll be constantly trying to play catch-up in the planning process.  So I’ve resolved to create my own lesson plan notebook that will have 20 unique storytime lesson plans for each of the three storytimes, with the intention that each lesson plan be used (repeated) twice a year.  This will also solve the eternal worry that I’m repeating certain songs more than others, and that my storytimes are becoming boring and too predictable (note that some predictability is desirable, though.)

Two years ago, Maureen from CMRLS generously gave me all of her storytime lesson plans on disk, and I have pillaged and made good use of those plans.  But it has become clear to me that storytime lesson plans are not too different from the instructional lesson plans that I used when I worked at Alcott School as a tutor: it’s best that I create and use my own, in order to achieve the greatest success.  Maureen possesses the ability to adapt new words to classic nursery rhymes, and I simply don’t have that skill; every time I’ve tried to use one of her very clever adaptations, I’ve stumbled and forgotten the words and then the tune and made a general ass out of myself.  It’s hard enough for me to carry a tune (some would argue impossible), let alone master new words, too. 

In creating my own lesson plans, I’m drawing from a variety of sources, most notably Maureen’s plans, but also a selection of books on storytimes written by early childhood experts.  Add to that my own expertise in phonology instruction and children’s literature, and I’m hoping that I’ll be able to create plans that are workable for me personally (requiring a minimum of memorization each week) and also offer a great deal for both the parents/caregivers and the children who attend.  Storytimes are partly about entertainment, partly about parents/caregivers learning new fingerplays and songs, partly about a group experience, partly about instilling a love of words and literature in young children, and partly about inclusion of rhymes, rhythm, and other valuable pre-reading skills that will help the child participants move into the reading phase of their lives.  It’s a delicate mix.

Where’s the innovation, though, you ask?  Truthfully, I’m not really being that innovative.  I’m not taking on anything that other children’s librarians haven’t already done.  But I am making a commitment, as a one-woman show, to offer the best, most developmentally appropriate storytimes that I can muster.  Perhaps any innovation that I offer comes through in the combination of projects that I’m taking on – the storytimes, the Advanced Reader section, the specific teen volunteer opportunities, the book groups that I offer.  Perhaps.

Children

Kids

From my conversations with kids this week:

A little boy, about seven, came up to me and said, with no preamble:  “Why don’t they have robots fight wars?  If robots did the shooting, then no people would die.”

From the same child, later in the same conversation, after he had explained to me how wars were fought by the Empire’s droids in Star Wars:  >sigh<  “People today just don’t get it.”

From a newly minted sixth grader, about moving up to the middle school:  “It’s ok, I guess.  You have a lot more freedom, and no one’s standing around watching you all the time.  But I miss recess.”

From a seventh grader, who spent Thursday afternoon doing her homework on my desk, and was reading a bit of her textbook aloud to me:  “It’s hard for me to pronounce the words today because of my palette expander.”  [my heart broke as I heard her read, because I can tell she’s very dyslexic and she really, really could use my help – how to offer tutoring to her parents for free without hurting their feelings?]

From the seven-and-a-half-year-old regular visitor to the children’s room, who always comes in without her mom and has long conversations with me:  (running back towards me as she’s about to leave – big hug for me…) “You smell good!” (…then runs back to the door) “Bye! Bye! Bye!”

From another new sixth grader:  “The new school’s ok, but it’s weird at dismissal time because everyone just scatters.  I don’t know where my friends went.”

Me, to the random bunch of kids I don’t know who invaded the children’s room Friday afternoon:  (whispering) “Guys, you need to use your library voices while you’re here.”  (I walk away)

The kids:  (titter titter, sarcastic tone)  “Use your library voices now.”  (titter titter)

I was mocked.  I could feel their eyeballs drilling holes into my back view as I walked away.  Sigh.

From the seven year old with the thoughts on war robots, as he ran back into my room for the tenth time that day:  “The library is my FAVORITE place to be!!!!  I LOVE it!!!”

Children, Librarianship

Where to begin?

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I kept hitting the snooze alarm this morning.  Not because I really wanted to sleep any longer, but because I wanted to delay the start of my day.  Last week, while on vacation, I realized that I could easily retire now, and spend the remainder of my days in blissful slothfulness. 

Why is that?  I know I love my job, and logically I know that I would be bored out of my mind if I didn’t work at least a bit.

So here’s why: tomorrow is the first day of school in the town where I work.  The summer reading program has barely finished (in fact, I just started the summer bookplate process yesterday), and school is about to start again.  Summer was so busy that I didn’t have a chance to pre-plan the fall storytimes like I wanted to, and school is about to start again.  The children’s room was crazy busy all summer, so much so that often I had a hard time breaking away to use the restroom, and the kids will be back in classes tomorrow.

Lisa, the reference librarian, was looking a bit haggard and stressed yesterday; in my post-vacation bliss,  it took me a few minutes to figure out why, then I did.

School starts tomorrow.

On a typical day last spring, Lisa or Nicole (who is on maternity leave at the moment) could count forty students up in the reference area, sometimes playing guitar in the study rooms, sometimes sneaking food, sometimes playing computer games, sometimes studying quietly.  Lisa’s role in the after school hours is to retain decorum and a semblance of silence in the reference area and the rest of the second floor.  I get far fewer students down in the children’s room, probably because it’s an enclosed space and I can see all indiscretions from my desk, but I too have a role in the after school hours: room monitor.  I try to keep the kids quiet (ha!), amused, and under control, and I try my best to do so without causing them to leave the children’s room and go up to the reference area.  Most afternoons I feel like a substitute teacher during a free study period.  In good weather I’ll assign the kids a soccer ball and tell them to go outside and play for a bit until they can come back and be quiet.  In bad weather I make a show of loaning them one of the “good” board games, and sometimes I even give them permission to play the game in the story room.

There’s not much time left in these after school hours for planning storytimes and ordering books.  Oftentimes I end up doing that work in unpaid hours at home or early in the morning before the library opens. 

So you can see why the start of school makes me a bit quesy.  I love the kids, but we need a better solution to the over-crowded, under-behaved, after-school set.

Now the second cup of coffee is in my belly (good thing I have a bottle of Tums in my desk at work) and I’m sufficiently jazzed up to get ready for work.  Maybe I’ll have time today to plan a gazillion storytimes.  Hmmmm.  I’d better wear my pink flowered shoes to get me in the mood.  And you can be sure that I’ll enjoy this last day of peace before the storm breaks.

Children, Teaching

When things don’t work out…

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I got fired yesterday.  No, no, no, not from my full-time gig as a children’s librarian: from a new tutoring job that I had taken on for this month.  I had agreed to tutor this student, who is going into the eighth grade at a school that specializes in Orton Gillingham, even though I had some reservations about my ability to help her.  My specialty is tutoring students using the Wilson Reading System, which is based upon Orton Gillingham, but differs in many practical ways from Orton Gillingham.

And the moment I arrived at the student’s house on Tuesday, I could see that the student had reservations, too.  It was abundantly clear from the start of that lesson that there was nothing I could do or be to win over this student.  Without a doubt, that lesson was the toughest one that I have ever taught.  Light humor didn’t work, being firm but fair didn’t work.  Not one of the three assignments that I gave in that hour interested the student.  As we got further into the hour, the student’s baseball cap came further and further down over her eyes, until I couldn’t see her face at all. 

I tried, but it was obvious this wasn’t going to work.  I sat down with the mother at the end of the lesson and told her that, in my opinion, her daughter didn’t want to be tutored.  The mother was very surprised, said she’d talk to her daughter and get back to me.  It was no shock to me when I got an email from the mother yesterday saying “thanks, but…”.

The moral of this tale?  These things can’t be forced.  This student probably needed a full summer break from school and learning, and nothing I could have done would have made her enjoy working with me.  I won’t take it personally.  Maybe.  🙂

Children, Children's literature, Summer reading

“Happy Harry Potter Day!”

That was at the head of a note that Nanette, our cataloger, left me on the CD-book version of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.  Nanette had come in early Saturday morning, even though she wasn’t working that day, in order to finish processing the CD-book (there hadn’t been a record in the system for her to attach to when she worked on Thursday).  Nanette was also the chosen person who handled and processed all of our Harry Potter copies.  As I might have mentioned before, and as any children’s librarian knows, I had to practically sign away my first-born child in order to receive the books before the release date.  And as any librarian knows, if you don’t receive the books before the release date, there’s no earthly way the books will be ready to be checked out on the release date, since they need to be covered, stamped, book pocketed, and entered into the catalog. 

Nanette was the perfect person to cover these books, though, since she confessed to having absolutely zero interest in the books.  No temptation to peek, since she really doesn’t care.  And thus, my totally subliminal fears that came out in my nightmares of Wednesday night were totally put to rest.  Thank you, Nanette.  🙂

But what of Harry Potter Day itself?  I knew I couldn’t compete with any of the big stores that were throwing huge bashes and selling books at 12:01 on Saturday, so I chose to run a very low-key event.  I found gobs and gobs of trivia quizzes, which I copied and stapled and arranged around the story room tables.  I sharpened dozens of pencils (to use on the quizzes), and I set up the special Harry Potter bookmarks that I “won” through a regional lottery.  And I set up raffle tickets and a raffle box for a copy of the new book.  No food, no decorations (not on our brand-new walls), no music, no goody bags.  The minimalist Harry Potter day.

A couple of dozen kids and their parents trickled in and out of the room from 11 AM to noon.  Some of the kids had dressed in costume as their favorite characters.  Some of the kids had a great time doing the trivia.  And some of the kids were clearly disappointed in my low-key party.  Oh well.  But when it came time to raffle off the copy of the book at noon, there was a rapt audience.  I shook that box up, down, and sideways, until the raffle tickets were well-mixed, then I announced to the gathered crowd that I sure hoped the winner was in the room, since it’s always a disappointment when I draw a winning ticket and the person isn’t in the room.

And then…drumroll…I drew the ticket.  “H— R— B—,” I announced, as I looked right at HRB’s older sister.  It took a couple of seconds for M—, the older sister, to process the news, then she started jumping up and down and screaming for her sister — and then she went running out into the children’s room, looping around the room looking for her sister, crying “Rosie! Rosie! Rosie! You won! You won! Rosie! Rosie! Rosie!  You WON!!!!”

It was the most joyful reaction I’ve seen in a long, long time, and it TOTALLY made my day.  Happy Harry Potter Day!!!!!

Children, Summer reading

A story

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Yesterday a mom told me this story:

Her son, who is about five, won a library raffle last week.  He won exactly the thing that he had wanted: a copy of Little Mouse by Bill Montague.  And he LOVES the book, which is about a little mouse that lived with Henry David Thoreau.  In fact, he loves the book SO much that his mother took him on a field trip to Concord the other day, visiting Walden Pond and the center of town.  The trip was such a hit that they’ll be going back again soon, to find the location of Thoreau’s house at the pond.

This little boy’s mom tells me that he now talks about Mr. Thoreau, and that his interest in this part of local history has been ignited by the book.  “You never know,” she says, “what will start an interest for a child, but this book has totally started a passion for him!”

I’ll be writing a letter today to Bill Montague, the owner of the Concord Mouse Trap, to thank him again for his generous donation to the summer reading program, and to let him know what an effect that donation has had on a young reader.

Children

The confidence of youth

There’s a cute little curly-headed girl who loves to come talk to me at the library.  She’s just finished first grade, has a charming British accent, and always carries a stuffed animal with her (Cheetah used to be her favorite, but now it’s a flattened, angular yellow teddy bear from IKEA).  She always half-glides, half-bounces up to the children’s desk with a big grin on her face, and with the confidence that surely I’ve been waiting all week to talk to her.  At the last two movie nights, she has joined me at my odd seat near the door (I’ve had to position my chair in front of the glass that’s next to the door, since kids kept walking into the glass) and chatted to me throughout the movie, telling me about her stuffed animal, the movie, just about anything.  Her mother just smiles patiently from across the room, occasionally rolling her eyes at her daughter’s social nature.

This little girl isn’t the only one like this, though.  I’ve been thinking lately about all of the kids who come beaming into the children’s room, knowing that I know them and want to talk with them.  And then there are the kids who used to have that confidence, but who no longer do: in particular, I think of one little boy who has just finished kindergarten, and who barely raises his eyes from the floor when he comes into the children’s room now.  He used to talk to me for a half hour at a time, but it’s hard to get three words out of him now.

His loss of self-confidence has come earlier than most kids, but there’s definitely a time in our childhood when we move from standing tall and secure to doubting ourselves and questioning our place in the world.  If only we could hang on to that sense of self for all of our lives – imagine what a different place the world would be, and how much happier all of our lives would be. 

Children, Spare time - Culture, Teaching

Bittersweet

Last evening Gayle and I went to a fifth grade performance of “You’re a Good Man, Charlie Brown.”  Gayle and I both used to be (note the past tense) SPED tutors at this elementary school, and two of our favorite students were in this play, one of them as the lead, Charlie Brown. 

I left the school in November of 2005 to take my current job, feeling very very guilty about leaving in the middle of the school year; it took a lot of rational thinking to convince myself that, for once, I needed to put my own career and financial needs ahead of the needs of my students.  It was a tough leaving, and to this day I feel rather hollow about having abandoned “my kids.” 

Gayle worked through the school year of ’05-’06, then left to take her own fourth grade classroom in another town.  In the remainder of that school year, Gayle spent a lot of time with the kids who were in last night’s play, and when she was invited to the performance there was no doubt that she wanted to attend.  She also convinced me to come, and we worked it with the SPED teacher, Rachel, that we would be a “special surprise” for the kids at the end of the show.  (Rachel talked up the “special surprise” for a couple of weeks, but the kids never guessed that it would be us.)

Sitting through the performance last night, I realized a couple of things.  First of all, though I had close bonds with the kids who played Charlie Brown and another lead role (we’ll call her “Janet”), I really didn’t know much about the other kids in the play.  Had this been the class of kids who are now 6th graders, or the kids who are now 7th graders, I probably would have been a weepy mess as I reunited with old friends and favorite students.   But the era of Abby at that school is pretty much past; the kids I spent so much time with have moved on, grown up.

I also realized that my self-esteem plummeted the moment that I walked into that school.  Though I was pretty great at my job there, it made me miserable to be the second-class citizen that is known as a “tutor.”  In my current job, I feel valued, respected, incredibly happy, and challenged.  I never dread going to the library the way I did school – I look forward to each day of work with enthusiasm.  Guess I’ve finally found my calling.

And then, after the show, Gayle and I chatted with the kids (hugs all around) and their parents, most especially Janet’s mom.  Janet’s mom is wonderful – sweet and kind and smart – and it felt like a knife through my heart when she told me that things were never as good for Janet at that school as they were when I was working with her.  She told me that Janet made so much progress in the year and a half she was with me, but after I left there just wasn’t anyone to fill the role that I had played in her life, and things were never the same.  I got a bit weepy, and told her how guilty I felt about leaving, and this gracious mom put a hand on my arm, looked me in the eye, and said, “Don’t feel guilty, please – I am SO happy for you, SO happy that you found a job that you love.”

It was a tough night: remembering where I’d been, feeling terrible about having abandoned kids who needed me, and also feeling so very thankful that I have moved on to a job and a role that makes ME happy and fulfilled.  Isn’t that always the challenge in life?  Keeping yourself happy while doing right by others?