knitting librarian

I’ve got a lot of things I need to pull together quickly this week and over the next month.

Tomorrow is our local AccessPA Fall Database Training so I need plans for a substitute for tomorrow and to organize the books on carts to be shelved. There’s a possibility that the library will be closed if they can’t find a substitute, so I really need things ready—but nothing may happen. Even if they do get a sub, there is still a chance that they’ll pull them to cover somewhere else in the building because someone else doesn’t show. The district is doing SOAR to Success training this week and there are a lot of subs already placed so we’re shorthanded all around.

Our professional goals are due on Friday. I am planning to do CSLA’s School Library Learning 2.0 as part of my goal. I am also going to read and figure out how to apply Teri Lesesne’s Naked Reading with our students. I have a colleague in Oregon who is interested in doing the SLL 2.0 with me for sure and we may work on the book study together too.

The district has grants available through the Education Foundation for teachers to do innovative projects. They’ll fund up to $1000. I’m working on a proposal for that to purchase graphic novels to place in the school library. I am going to add in some other books that are popular like the Orca Soundings and Orca Currents titles because of the high interest/lower reading level of their books. I know that all of these will be popular with our students and they’d really benefit from having them available.

In October I’m meeting with our district grant writer, the assistant superintendent, and the library coordinator to get things underway for the 2008 Literacy Through School Libraries grant. I really think that we can put together a meaningful proposal and hopefully do something to improve the situation of our district libraries.

So, that’s what I’ve got on the burner right now. I’m excited about it all.

Photojojo » Make Your Own Photo Journals and Notebooks

By way of Oh My Stinkin’ Heck, these look really fun and like something I might want to make someday. Hopefully I’ll even remember!

Well, somehow the last few weeks have gotten away from me and I haven’t had much I was willing to say. I guess I still feel that way about a few different things, but I’m always up for bragging on my little darlings!

AJ went camping with my mom and Vince last Sunday through Tuesday. They did some biking on the Rails to Trails path above Pine Creek State Park. Apparently they saw a bear digging in a garbage dumpster and eating trash. Some time either before or after that, they found some bear “scat” (according to Pop) and examined it to determine what the bear ate. AJ says he ate grapes and acorns (there were seeds and shells in the waste I guess!)

Zoe has been eating like a trooper and doing a pretty good job of keeping things down, although she has also been drooling up a storm so she can go through quite a few bibs in the course of a day. She’s getting some chunky thighs and looks so cute. Today, Mom was feeding her but she spent most of that time with her head turned to look at me, so a good bit of her bottle leaked out of the corner of her mouth and all over her bib and through that to her outfit.

We’ve had gorgeous weather and today was no exception. We took the bikes and rode with AJ on the bike path near mom’s. AJ is doing great with starting and stopping on his own. He had one incident where he fell, but the pedal came off the bike, so in all fairness, he really wasn’t at fault there. He had no idea what to do with his foot when that happened! (Poor kid!) This afternoon we went to see a local college soccer game and met up with his friend from school. AJ and G had a great time playing soccer and Power R@ngers. We moms kept being captured and locked in a dungeon. It was so toasty that I think I’ve got a bit of color from standing out there in the sun for 2 hours during the game. We left before overtime started. The score was 0-0 when we left.

I’ve been reading Twilight by Stephenie Meyer and really enjoyed it. I finished it up yesterday afternoon after the Penn State game was over. I’d been reading it, but kept getting interrupted by kids or falling asleep. A student was popping in the library every day to ask if I’d finished it and she could borrow it. She had it over the weekend last week and I got it back from her on Friday so I finished it up over the weekend. I’m looking forward to reading the next two in the series. They’re pretty well written and very enjoyable. It’s nice to find books that I like to read and have no qualms recommending to students. I read last week that MTV has bought the rights to the movie, so I bet it will be flying off my shelves frequently this school year. I think I got our copy from the book fair and a student donated the sequels to the library after she’d finished reading them. So nice to have students who want to give back. Over the weekend it hit me that she’s got a last name that might make her related to a high school basketball star I graduated with, so I’ll have to remember to ask her if he’s her daddy or uncle or anything!

NYPL Pays Students $50 to Sign Up for a Library Card – 9/18/2007 2:05:00 PM - School Library Journal
Wow! I know my students would love this opportunity. I can just hear them spending their $50 in their heads.

What an idea—and paid for by a private grant given to the city government. Bloomberg is also offering students in grades 4-7 to earn cash rewards for achievement on standardized tests. That’s one way to ensure that some students don’t “make a pattern with the bubble sheet” or figure that since it isn’t for a grade on their report card they don’t have to do well! It will be interesting to see how it works out for them long-term and how much they have to pay out.

I got my Ravelry invitation tonight and have been fiddling around for the last 2 hours trying to learn how to use it. It’s pretty self-explanatory—I’m mostly making it harder than it needs to be!

Back to revelling in Ravelry!