Yo-Yos Are Big in Windsor

Mexican yoyos from Wikipedia

June 19, 2015, post on Facebook:

Windsor Public Library will be having a bi-weekly Yo-Yo Club for ALL ages (kids, teens AND adults!). Yo-Yo Club will meet every other Wednesday at 2:30pm starting Wed. June 24th. New yo-yo students receive a card with a trick list on it. Learn cool tricks and earn proficiencies of Novice, Expert, Master, Pro, and Grand Master! Classes are taught by our director, who also happens to be a former international yo-yo performer! Bring your own yo-yo, or let us help you purchase a yo-yo for use. Yo-yos are also available to borrow for classes and to check out through the library. Many thanks to All For KIDZ, producers of The NED Show, for their donation of yo-yos, holsters, and extra string!

There’s a lesson here: if the director has a special talent, the library can plan a whole program around it! Christine Porter offered the first workshop in February and 20 people came. Another good turnout happened in April– so the Library launched an official club as soon as school closed for the summer.

Post-it Note Quilt

Lanpher Memorial Library invites community expression with a quick quilt idea. Add a favorite book or doodle, and build a summer exhibit! Love the participation!

Next time you stop in at the Lanpher Library, consider adding a square to our Post-it Quilt. There are doodles, quotes, titles of favorite books, stickers…let’s see what we can create!

Comic Decorating at Fairlee Public Library

Eye-catching image for a craft event, part of June Happenings at Fairlee’s Escape the Ordinary Summer Reading Program.

June 26th at 7pm
Summer Reading Program
Bring your own shoes (or anything else) you would like to decorate with comics. We will provide the comics and other supplies.

Post-it Note Art Show

Manchester Community Library is hosting a participatory event for any and all artists. Prizes include Best Animal, Best Portrait, and Best Representation of a Book. Awesome idea!

Stop by The Loft anytime during the month of March and create your own artwork for the Post-it Note Art Show. All supplies will be provided and your art will be on display all month long. Enter your Post-it art and win awesome gift cards! Judges will choose the top in each category on April 1st, 2015 – Multiple entries allowed.

Literary Peeps, now in a VT library near you

Norwich Public Library announced its second Peeps diorama contest with literary quotes:

“To peep, or not to Peep: that is the question.”
– Peeplet, by William Shakespeep

“Frankly, my dear, I don’t give a Peep!”
– Gone with the Peep

Here are Norwich‘s rules for 2015:
Make a diorama featuring these silly, festive, squishy marshmallow treats. Your scene must be based on anything (books, DVDs, magazines, puzzles, museum passes, etc.) in the Norwich Public Library collection.

When
Entries accepted: From 1pm Monday, March 23 – Monday, March 30th at 4:59pm.
Voting is open from 5pm on Monday, March 30th – Saturday, April 4th at 3pm.
Voting will be done by paper ballots, available at the Library.
We will announce the winners on Monday, April 6th.
Entries will remain on display until Thursday, April 9th at 8pm.

How
For contest rules and guidelines, check our website or stop in at the Library.
Inspiration can be found by searching our online catalog or stopping in to the Library to browse the shelves!

Who
Participants may enter in one of three Categories:
Adult/Teen: over 12
Child(ren): 12 and under
Group (families/organizations etc.)

Minecraft IRL (in real life)

Sam Maskell offers a Minecraft Middle School event with printables for swords and hilts, scavenger hunt sheets, and design sheets, here Minecraft IRL

Attendees made swords of poster board (floppy enough to discourage sword fights) and then competed in the scavenger hunt. Sample questions:
Find three books turned into movies
What are the names of all the Weasley children?
What book won last year’s DCF award?

After the hunt, kids worked with beads and perler pegboards on Minecraft projects like the stone pickaxe. Afterschool fun at of the Rockingham Free Public Library!

Extra mileage from the newsletter

Ilsley uses large screen to promote programs

The Ilsley Public Library features two inhouse displays of the library newsletter. The more traditional is a large plexiglass holder with the enlarged newsletter displayed.

The local public access TV station also programs highlights from the newsletter onto a big screen. Standing in the library, people see coming programs, photos and services proceeding across the screen. In the shot above, parents are advised to borrow “Get Well Bags” to take home, instead of bringing sick children into the library.

Ilsley posts the newsletter inside the library.

Hackerspace!

Windsor Public Library took a note from Linda Braun’s Technology Workshop in Barre last summer, and planned an informal hacker/maker space for kids. Sarah Tufts wanted “a place where a kid could feel free to break something apart and not worry about getting in trouble.” She put the word out and collected fans, toasters, a paper shredder, a lamp, a hot plate, an alarm clock, and old zip drives. The library decided not to accept cell phones, computers, with concerns about what the batteries might contain.

Sarah:

We used basic tools (screw drivers – all sizes, wrenches, pliers, wire cutters, flashlights, and ONE hammer). The hammer didn’t really get used until the very end, and probably shouldn’t have been used at all.

I thought about safety glasses, but only had 2 so didn’t bother. They might have come in handy when one kid took a hammer to the glass door of the toaster oven while trying to pry off the handle. The shattering sound surprised everyone; thank goodness for safety glass:)

There were 2 rules:

1. No plugging anything in EVER before, during, or after the program. Recommended: cut electrical cords cut off before the program.

2. All screws, nuts, bolts, etc. get put on a long strip of tape as soon as they are removed from the appliance. This was in case kids wanted to try to reassemble the piece, but mostly so that all those tiny pieces didn’t get lost – so easily camouflaged in our rug.

The Library had David Macaulay’s “The Way Things Work” on hand and also googled images when the book didn’t answer questions.

Total success and an expanded audience including dads.

Easy Dad Program

It’s great when you find an easy program aimed at dads and their kids. Brooks Memorial Library is having success with the Dads Day Derby. They collect the cardboard tubes and duct tape ahead of time and purchase small plastic cars. This program really does run itself– though the staff build a prototype ahead.

When families turn up, each gets a supply of tubes and tape. All activity is self-directed, making the racetrack and then shooting the toy car down. Two hours– and plenty of fun. Note: Brooks Memorial serves Brattleboro, which is big enough so pre-registering families works for them. A smaller library could probably skip this step.

Fairlee Reads across Generations

The Elementary School in Fairlee purchased eReaders for the school with a grant from the Vermont Rural Partnership.

As part of the after school program, the school Visions Director took students to the Fairlee Public Library with the school eReaders. Students met community mentors and the mentors and students used the eReaders to read stories together. Fairlee librarian Judy Russell pointed out that senior citizens are the fastest growing group to use eReaders.