How the Rice Lake Public Library Joined the World of TikTok

How the Rice Lake Public Library Joined the World of TikTok

Photo by Kon Karampelas on Unsplash Many thanks to Lindy and Claire from the RIce Lake Public Library for this guest post!  They were also featured in a School Library Journal article in August!  Here’s a link to What Makes These Librarians TikTok? Here is a...

Learning at Home Resources

Thanks to the IFLS Youth Services librarians who have worked hard to crowd-source two documents, one for families switching to homeschooling (private, home-baseed education), another for families who are switching to virtual public school due to the pandemic.  These...

More Tools for Collection Development and Promotion

There is so much to do and think about related to racism and trying to be an antiracist, and one of the simplest and most library-centric things to do is to examine our collections and the books we promote to make sure that they reflect our diverse world. ...
Maybe he needs a ball

Maybe he needs a ball

The year after I finished college, I worked part time at a community-based literacy program in southeast Washington DC.  As part of my internship, I  coordinated a book donation project and distributed children’s books to kids at the nearby housing project.  I...
Decision-Making Guide from UW-Madison Extension

Decision-Making Guide from UW-Madison Extension

I’ve been finding for myself (and hearing from others both in and out of libraries) that one of the most stressful things about COVID-19 is the endless need to make decisions.  And then often needing to second-guess those decisions, or make new decisions based...
Wisconsin Science Festival:  Curiosity Unleashed!

Wisconsin Science Festival: Curiosity Unleashed!

Stacey from Augusta reminded me about the upcoming Wisconsin Science Festival, October 15-18.  This is a great opportunity to share science-related programming with your community and be part of a state-wide effort.  And they are all set to help support a...
Resource Roundup: Virtual Storytime Toolkit and Homeschooling Collection Development

Resource Roundup: Virtual Storytime Toolkit and Homeschooling Collection Development

When answering a question today I realized I have not made enough fanfare about the fantastic new resource from the Association for Library Service to Children:  The Virtual Storytime Services Guide.  So much good information, good ideas, best practices, tools.  Wow. ...
John Lewis, Good Trouble, and March

John Lewis, Good Trouble, and March

Representative John Lewis died over the weekend.  My heart gets full with gratitude when I think of him, all the work he did for our nation.  He was a United States Representative from Georgia for more than three decades, and before that he was a leader in the Civil...
Reimagining Youth Services–Looking Down the Road

Reimagining Youth Services–Looking Down the Road

I somehow missed the first article in the School Library Journal series about taking COVID 19 as an opportunity to re-think youth services, but I read the second one and it really resonated with me.  There has been so much STUFF to think about right now, with trying...
Homeschooling

Homeschooling

Homeschooling looks lots of different ways.  Here’s a homeschooler who built a cob oven (out of clay and sand–a multi-day project), built a fire inside it, and is approaching it with swim goggles for protection from smoke in the eyes.  Next...

What Jessica Bratt Is Up to These Days

Many of you hopefully remember Jessica Bratt, who presented a great webinar for the Wild Wisconsin Winter Web Conference in 2019 titled Let’s Talk About Race, about how to successfully talk about race in a positive way in storytime with very young children and...

Stories about StoryWalks®

Thanks to Valerie from Ladysmith for sharing this wonderful guest blog post about creating a StoryWalk® for Ladysmith.  I had the idea a couple of years ago when I first saw a library with a StoryWalk®. They were using lawn signs, which are great, but I wanted...