Beloit College Mindset List

This year the list begins,

"For these students, Benny Hill, Sam Kinison, Sam Walton, Bert Parks and Tony Perkins have always been dead.

1. Few in the class know how to write in cursive.

2. Email is just too slow, and they seldom if ever use snail mail."

Cake Wreck

Today we celebrated SC's pending graduation from library school. two of us set the kitchen straight and put out the food, everyone gathered -- and just as the knife was poised for the first slice, SP blurted -- Oh no -- we got a cake wreck! None of us had noticed.

(She would tag this one mithspellings.)

Lexiles

It looked like exciting news: a website that would explain Lexiles, allow you to search for books, and then click on a WorldCat button (next to the Amazon and Barnes & Noble buttons) to search for the book in a library. Making "find in a library" as easy as "buy now" is something OCLC / WorldCat can do for the good of the cause. (Read announcement here.)

However, as often happens, it looks like algorithms or set age ranges power it -- sometimes with poor results. The fabulous Audrey Wait (760 Lexile), for example, comes up as for ages 12 and up. For many 12 year-olds that much swearing, with some sexual content, is fine, but when I finished it my mental note was "for older teens." The delightful Mysterious Benedict Society, which I just started, gets a higher Lexile score (890) than Audrey or The Hunger Games (also ages 12 and up, to this site), and receives an age recommendation of 8 - 12, which seems about right.

Potentially useful; use with caution.

New in Reference

Three books for RA for teens arrived this week.

Radical Reads 2, by Joni Richards Bodart is dense and seems to be designed to help a librarian or teacher book talk a book, or even lead book club on it, without reading it. But then there's about two pages aimed at students, "Tips for Writing Effective Book Reports." Odd.
Call number = YA REF 028.535 BODART 2010

Genre Talks for Teens, by Lucy Schall covers some of the same ground as Radical Reads, but is a little more useful for making quick display choices or read-alike decisions. Short summaries of some summer reading list books, including Black Duck and The Book Thief.
Call number = REF 028.55 SCHALL

The Ultimate Teen Book Guide, Hahn, Flynn, Reuben, eds. is browseable and has lots of lists which will help with displays. Let's try keeping this at the Info Desk to supplement the Teen Readers' Advisory note book.

Shower

Kids' Online Safety Books

Hi –

We just got in two books that you may wish to suggest to patrons who have children BEFORE they start emailing or dipping their feet into social networking:

A Smart Kid’s Guide to Avoiding Online Predators and A Smart Kid’s Guide to Internet Privacy – both by Jakubiak. They will be shelved with Juv Non-Fic/Adult Non-Fic .

These are written for the youngsters themselves - not their parents – and are appropriate for 3rd graders on up.

Art Guitars

On display now, three art guitars made by Henrico Co. Schools students. Discarded guitars have been given a second life by the students, and will be auctioned off on April 17 (beginning at 11 a.m.) at the Sam Ash Guitar location at 9110 A West Broad St. Proceeds go to HCPS. A sign in teen area, along with a display of music books (fiction and non) gives this info.

Teen Health & Wellness DB trial

In honor of Teen Tech Week, Rosen Publishing has made its Teen Health & Wellness database available for free. It will be available from now until April 15. User name: teentech ; password: teentech. It could be helpful of projects. Link to site.

(For Teen Tech Week, NP will host an MP3 Listening Party on March 10.)

Census

HCPL locations that are currently slated to receive “Be Counted” boxes from the Census to be used between March 19 and April 19: FA, NP, TU, VA, TW, and DU. MU may be an alternate.

Their selections are based on their census target areas. They will deliver the boxes to you before March 19. Nothing is required from us except a place to put it. It is plastic and holds 8.5x11 forms. The Census will replenish forms etc. If by chance you need a contact for the boxes once you receive them, the number for the Henrico area Census office is 916-6379.

The library will support one “US Census QAC” (Questionnaire Assistance Center) where people can get help with forms or have their questions answered. This will be at DU from March 19-April 19 with specific times set-up by the Census and DU. The census will publicize those times later.

More Snow

Here's a "before" picture of Mount NP, in case we decided to take bets on how long it takes to melt. It is made of snow from snowfalls on January 30, February 6 and February 10. There was a trace of snow from the 12/ 18/09 plow mountain before the January snow.