Friday, November 21, 2014

100+ Years of Children's Storytimes at the Public Library

chicken says book book

"The story hour is. . .becoming universal,
and librarians should co-operate with primary teachers,
but should not be expected to give too much of their time
for the mere amusement of children." 


-- Alice Whitlock, librarian, 
speaking at the 1914 California Library Association Convention held in the office
of the Santa Clara County Library Librarian at the Hall of Justice, San Jose, CA.
(San Jose Mercury News, October 25, 1914)
 
 
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Alice and Joanie B. were two happy library-hens - it was storytime day and Peanut Butter and Jelly jumping with Greg and Steve was on the schedule.
 


 
"Peanuuutt, Peanut Butter
And JELLY!!!"
jumping chicken
 
Alice: Bawk! I love to jump really high to Peanut Butter and -- JELLY!!

Alice (taking a moment to catch her breath): What's our theme for storytime today?

Joanie B: Why chickens, of course . . . which calls for. . .

Alice and Joanie B: . . .the CHICKEN DANCE!!
dancing chicke

Alice and Joanie B.
love all their stories and storytimes.
Whether preschool
or toddler,
baby,
or family - 
These library-hens know with certainty
that library storytimes define
the best way to spend anyone's time!
 
Joanie B: Ahhhk, library storytimes always give me the warm and fuzzies. . .

Alice: Mawwwk! I wonder how library storytimes were invented? SCCLD is 100 years old . . .back in the day 1914. . .

Joanie B:  Wrawwwt did library hens 100 or 50 or 25 years ago -  do for their little chicks and early-literacy?

Alice:  Bawk! Time to put on our library-histori-hen-hats...

Joanie B: ...And fire up the SCCLD databases!
 

Alice set to work searching the San Jose Mercury News Historical Archive (1886-1922).

Joanie B. took up the Academic Search Complete and the New York Times.

Both library-hens squawked with other librarians (old, young and in-between) about their storytime history. Then they piled up all the articles, antedotes, quotes, and old faded photos and scratched through for seeds and worms of information to puzzle together the story of storytime for children at the library.


Alice:  Bawk!  Looks to me that the first storytimes were called story hour - and were for school-age students. Look at this article from 1913 in the San Jose Mercury (Alice pointing her right-wing at the computer screen) "Saturday Story Hour at Library is Enjoyed - Object is to Stimulate an Interest in the World's Best Literature."


Joanie B: Beak-cause the early library-hens didn't have picture books.  They told stories from from Longfellow or Greek myths or fairy tales and other legends. . .






. . .or from school readers, like:

Kewpie Primer


Alice:  Bawk-in-the-day, in 1914 when SCCLD was a baby library district, Children's library services in America were only about 10 years old.


Joanie B:  In the really old libraries, before SCCLD, children were not allowed to come inuntil they were old enough to read! Thank goodness for library-hens like Anne Carroll Moore - who created the first libraries for children and got publishers to publish story books for them. . . 

Miss Moore Thought Otherwise


Alice:  ... like Frederic Melcher, book editor, and the children's librarians who started. . .

John Newbery Award

. .the John Newbery Award, in 1922, "to the author of the most distinguished contribution to American literature for children. . . ."



Joanie B:  And then, finally . . .

Caldecott medal


Caldecott Award, starting in 1938, to the artist of the most distinguished American picture book for children!


Alice:  Sook, sook, after that, in the 1940s and 1950s, story hour became storytime, full of little chicks, but only preschoolers.

Joanie B:  Bawk the time the children's author, Ruth Tooze, came to the Milpitas Library, at the old Calaveras Branch, in 1967. . .

 
Author Ruth Tooze Tells Stories in Milpitas, 1967
Three Tales of Monkey
1968 Author ruth tooze milpitas ca
Courtesy of Santa Clara County Archives

Alice:  . . .Storytime was a regular feature of libraries everywhere - for preschoolers (pre-Kindergarten) . . .but, Library-hens didn't squawk for toddlers and whole families, until the late 1980s.

Joanie B:  Wrawwk, newly hatched baby chicks had their first storytimes in the 1990s and 2000s.

Alice: Ahhawk we've been jumping to Greg and Steve's Peanut Butter and Jelly since 2002 - it's historical!

 
Alice and Joanie B flapped their wings and jumped -

pb and j

NOTES FROM LAURENJOAN -


Libraries and storytime - are like peanut butter and jelly - they belong together.  Could it be there was a time when this wasn't so?  Apparently.  Storytime, something so sweet, nourishing and natural, actually took time to properly evolve.   Even as library service to children has been tied to society's (sometimes out-of-step) overall view of children and what was "good for them" - as children (and their parents) responded to whatever libraries offered them, then libraries responded back -- usually with more and more and more.

It is hard to fathom that libraries did not always provide this deeply enriching service. Thank goodness for savy and caring librarians (to this day) who felt (and feel) compelled to reach outside the box of current thinking to bring a creative force of service to our libraries!

Lucky for us, Santa Clara County Library was formed in 1914, riding a wave of library enthusiasm that had grown country-wide since the late 1890s -- in good part thanks to Andrew Carnegie and his love of books and reading -- and the investment of his wealth in building public libraries open to people of all ages and backgrounds. 

For more information on Andrew Carnegie - try:
How Andrew Carnegie Turned His Fortune Into a Library Legacy

The article above is from a series on Public Libraries:
npr.org - Keys to the Whole Wide World: American Public Libraries

For more information on how to raise a reader - from the start of a child's life (in addition to regular library storytime attendance, of course) - try:
 
Born ReadingReading in the Wild


Raising a Reader List
   

To find a SCCLD storytime near you - try our Kids Events.

A few other posts regarding libraries from Alice and Joanie B. by Laurenjoan:

Melvil Dewey - creater of the Dewey Decimal System
Early Literacy for Your Little Chicks
Lexile and librarians

Alice and Joanie B. by Laurenjoan


 
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Graphic sources: 
http://all.worth1000.com/artists/blackdogdesigner
http://www.netanimations.net/Moving-animated-picture-dance-chicken-dance.gif
http://storytimekatie.com/2011/09/16/flannel-friday-five-little-monkeys/
http://www.loc.gov/pictures/resource/ppmsca.19359/
 

Friday, October 10, 2014

Dear Parent, Low Tech is Best for Little Chicks. Sincerely, Steve (Jobs)

Dear Parents, Low Tech is Best for Little Chicks, sincerely, Steve (Jobs)

Steve Job Low Tech Parent
Alice and Joanie B. love their technologies -
they are library-hens after all -- and,
especially in the morning (before work) --
there's nothing like a cup o' chicken scratch to peck at,
a fresh worm from the garden, and--
the news on their tablets...



Joanie B, avowed (paying)
digital news subscriber.
Alice loves her (free) indepth
news coverage of issues of the day
Joanie B. reads NYTAlice reads Huffpost
 Favorites:  New York Times,
 
the SF Chron with some VICE for spice. 
Favorites:  Salon.com and Huffpost,
with a little Aljazeera (English) on the side.

Their corn-scratch brimming
and spilling across the (messy) coop,
the intrepid library-hens turned to their screens
brightly glowing in the early morning light . . .

"Yay! NYT a-waits me," thought Joanie B.
Once Opinions and Paul Krugman were aside
she swiped through to Fashion and Style --

"Baaawwwkk!!" Joanie B. squawked in shock,
nearly chocking on a worm,
"Who would have thought. .
the technology apple of my eye --
Steve Jobs. .  .
Man o' Macintosh fame,
ipod, iphone, ipad
just a few by name,
was low tech --
when it came to his own little chicks!"

Steve Jobs Was a Low Tech Parent

by Nick Bilton

New York Times
While some tech parents assign limits based on time, others are much stricter about what their children are allowed to do with screens .CreditJonathan Nackstrand/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

Joanie B. (bawking aloud) "Nick Bilton crows --"

...So, your kids must love the iPad?” I asked Mr. Jobs. . . . The company’s first tablet was just hitting the shelves. “They haven’t used it,” he told me. “We limit how much technology our kids use at home.”

...Since then, I’ve met a number of technology chief executives and venture capitalists who say similar things: they strictly limit their children’s screen time, often banning all gadgets on school nights, and allocating ascetic time limits on weekends.
Joanie B:
Weck, I have to agree with the titans of technology.
Little chicks need a guiding wing through
the wonders and wilds of the world rawwk! in real time and online.

Not to be out-squawked,
Alice laid an egg
of an essay
on Joanie B's news feats
about Steve and his parenting...

Tech is killing childhood

Time spent on gadgets could be hampering kids' ability to connect to each other and the "real" world


Alice:  "Waawwk?!  This is serious crowing from author Catherine Steine-Adair. . .
… the old information highway has become a fast lane into…the vast online world….. Parents feel hard-pressed to get up to speed in new ways as gatekeepers, screen monitors, tech support, and cyberlife referees, in addition to the just plain human side of parenting.

Alice:  Wrrawwwk! - this article is from a book we have at SCCLD libraries:
Big Disconnect book cover





 




Alice and Joanie B. both closed their tablets and looked up. The sky was very blue, filled with a menagerie of fluffy white clouds. Suddenly, a hummingbird zipped by, tasting the red nectar feeder hanging from the orange tree. The orange tree was filled with new, tiny green oranges, hidden among thickets of leaves.  An early morning breeze, with a bit of autumn chill, ruffled the feathers on their tails.

Joanie B:  Waaawwk! Look at those clouds - I see the shape of a great, giant rooster crowing up there. . .

Alice:  Bawk! That's not a rooster, its a mother hen calling her chicks to come scratch for worms. . .

Joanie B:  Scraaaak, I see a GIANT PUMPKIN up there in the sky -

Alice: Haaaa - is that Linus hiding under a cloud pumpkin vine?

The library-hens continued to debate the shape of the clouds, forgetting all about news, technology, Salon.com and NYT.  There would be plenty of time to tune into their tablets and finish their computer work, after storytime, after the school kids, (who came into the library in the afternoon, squawking and asking for help in finding just the right book for a report due soon [tomorrow]). . .had all gone home.

NOTES FROM LAURENJOAN


I have to say - that like Alice and Joanie B. - I am a total news hound and love my free (and paid) news sources on the web.  However, I was surprised to see and read the article about Steve Jobs and low tech parenting on the NYT (and Huffingtonpost).  I guess I was assuming otherwise, in regard to Steven Jobs especially!

Parenting for any generation has enormous challenges.  How do we keep our children safe, without dampening their spirits or desire to learn, explore, and grow?  Fairy tales were once told to teach children about the dangers in the world -- so they would know to watch out and respond from within, find courage and commonsense when challenged by life and circumstances.

For my parenting generation, raising my children meant limiting television and computer games.  This seems so simple and straight-forward, in looking back from today. The internet was still a work in progress in the 1990s and early 2000s.  With the introduction of Web 2.0 and social media, the complexity of interaction and possible exposure to vast amounts of questionable information and sharing (or cyberbullying) grew tremendously.  Then, the invention of smart phones, the ipad and tablet technology -- the touch screen -- morphed us into whole new world of possibilities, exposure and impact.

The wonders and the magic and the educational potential of today's technology are without question. But, there is a question to ask ourselves regarding healthy technology exposure -- "how much and what kind of screen time is good for my child" --  whether a baby, toddler, preschooler, school-age child or teenager?

To contemplate and develop your own tech-parenting style and limitations -- SCCLD libraries have many excellent resources to choose from.  Here are a few:

Low Tech Parenting Resources and Ideas
iRules bookGrowing up Social book
For more information:

Low Tech Parenting
Book List


For guidelines and ideas - quick references - on-line try:

American Academy of Pediatrics   Media and Children

Kids and Technology: When to Limit It and How  (from About.com)


Alice and Joanie B. by Laurenjoan


Graphics sources:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/08/13/tech-is-killing-childhood_n_3749176.html
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Saturday, February 15, 2014

Chickens Cross the Road Not Taken...


Alice and Joanie B. Dream of a World of Roads to Cross...

chickens on the road

In the New Year, Alice and Joanie B. are chickens who are ever questioning and questing--pecking around for answers through their adventures, crossing many roads. The inner-chicken always crowing for exploration and chicken-self-determination.

For Alice and Joanie B. - such restless angst is best addressed through poetry, whether chicken themed or chicken nuanced.  Thus, we find our fair-feathered-library-hens squawking aloud  -- in chicken-speak (translations provided in parenthesis) -- their favorite poem addressing a chicken's relationship to roads...

Alice: Rawkkk!  The Road Not Taken

Joanie B: Bawk Rawwwkbert Frawwost....

Alice:  Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
            And sorry I could not travel both
           And be one chicken, (traveler), long I roosted (stood)
           And pecked (looked) down one as far as I could
           To where it bent in the undergrowth.

Joanie B:  Then chook (took) the other, as just as feathered (fair)
                    And having perhaps the better croak (claim)
                    Beak-cause it was grassy and wanted worms (wear)
                   Though as for that the scratching (passing) there
                   Had wraww-worn them really about the same,

Alice:  And both that morning equally laid an egg (lay)
           In leaves no claw (step) had scratched (trodden) black.
           Yet knowing how wraaawwk (way) leads to wraaawwkk (way),
            I doubted if I should ever scratch back (come back).

Joanie B:  I shall be crooning (telling) this with a squawk (sigh)
                    Somewhere eggs and eggs (ages and ages) hen (hence)
                    Two roads diverged in a wood, and I---
                    I chook-chook (took) the one less crossed (traveled) by;
                    And that has made all the differ-hen-ce (difference).
             
chicken on a yellow wood road

 















...And somehow in the course of their chicken recitation, Alice and Joanie B. find solace, their yearning assuaged by the language of roads and poets...(within the poetic collection at SCCLD of course) - or, as Antonio Machado (Translated by Alan S. Trueblood) writes in a poem found in   A Family of Poems:

Has My Heart Gone to Sleep?
Has my heart gone to sleep:
Have the beehives of my dreams
stopped working, the waterwheel
of the mind run dry,
scoops turning empty,
only shadow inside?
No, my heart is not asleep.
It is awake, wide awake.
Not asleep, not dreaming--
its eyes are open wide
watching distant signals, listening
on the rim of the vast silence.
chickens in the sunset


Robert Frost
Robert Frost

Notes from Laurenjoan:

Chickens, roads, poetry - the very stuff of life - hear the real  Robert Frost,  *himself* reading the real poem "The Road Not Taken" (minus interpretation by chickens) with the *real* poem printed below:




The Road Not Taken 
by Robert Frost
(1874-1963)
Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;
Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that, the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,
And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.
I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.
(Source SCCLD Online Resource:  The Columbia Granger's World of Poetry)

Alice and Joanie B by Laurenjoan logo

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**Interested in reading more Alice & Joanie B. by Laurenjoan adventures?
Well then, click here**
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Graphics sources:
http://i105.photobucket.com/albums/m223/blinao89/woods.jpg
http://www.lesausa.org/news/pictures-of-the-week-highlight-chicken-crossin-the-road
http://blog.mypetchicken.com/2013/01/18/one-of-the-best-things-about-backyard-chickens/

Chick Lit + Rooster Romance = Happy Egg Story


Ahhh...
chickens and roosters and romance stories....
can it mean happy eggs?

Reading to chicks

Alice and Joanie B, library-hens, take their chick lit seriously - readers' advisory is at the top of their professional pecking order....no wonder Alice "bawked! " when she saw the "so-crowed" news from the U.K.:

Breaking News!!

 Reveal. co.uk

REAL LIFE STORIES

Chick lit -- for hens!
First Book Aimed at Chickens Has Been Written


Metrologo

Fifty Shades of Hay:

Author Pens Chick Lit Novel

Falling for Clooney

Alice:  Baaawwk!  Would you peck at this Joanie B - "first book aimed at chickens" -
and hoooww they are bawking about it on Youtube...
Joanie B. pecked the replay on the Youtube video:  Falling for Clooney
.... as Alice crowed on and on...Joanie B was entranced...shellbound...in fact,
egg--egg--chanted!




Joanie B:  I think I need to lay an egg, right now!
"Bawk, ba bawk, ba baaawwk, bawk!" Joanie B. sang her egg song to the tune of
"Some Egg-chanted Evening."
Joanie B's egg son

Alice:  Brek! Joanie B's falling for "Falling for Clooney" ... as for me...I'd advise my fellow feathered hen friends to read about some fine roosters at SCCLD like:

Elvis the Rooster and the Magic Words
Elvis the Rooster and the Magic Words

Alice:  ...or read about some Bawk n Rolling rooster...
Bawk & Roll
Bawk & Roll

Alice:  Finding a good read about roosters at the library will make you want to check out:


Alice the chicken talks

alice the chicken











Notes from Laurenjoan:

It's true - Chick Lit for chickens - an idea for a rooster romance in audio book form that was commissioned by the Happy Egg Company in the UK --  "to play to our girls to help them settle at night" -- after research found that "the human voice can have a calming effect on laying hens."
Well, if they'd asked anybody who gets a bedtime story read to them - they coulda told them all about the calming/sleepy feeling of a good story at nighttime!
Richard Scarry's Bedtime Stories
Richard Scarry's Bedtime Stories
The Random House Book of Bedtime Stories
The Random House
Book of Bedtime Stories

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Alice and Joanie B by Laurenjoan logo

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**Interested in reading more Alice & Joanie B. by Laurenjoan adventures?
Well then, click here**
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Graphics sources:
http://thehappyegg.co.uk/chicklit/
http://priyakuriyan.blogspot.com/2013/12/rooster-raga-for-tulika-books.html
http://www.reveal.co.uk/real-life-stories/news/a511755/chick-lit-for-hens-first-book-aimed-at-chickens-has-been-written.html