This was such a fun library – filled with people doing all kinds of neat work!! You can tell when you visit a library with lots of positive energy, and it makes the whole thing work so well!

This is the entrance. You can tell already there is a good energy in here. There are bright colors, cute design, and those books sitting on the shelves are available for kids to just take home and keep! If you look over the doorway, you can see the wolf family; and Talahi is the home of the Timberwolves. (I love seeing art incorporated into the library!)

Things may look slightly different now, but the day I was there this was the amazing sight I had as I walked inside. Yes – those are dragons!! (The second dragon is scheduled to also move up to the ceiling.) How excellent is this?? So great! This was a grant funded project to bring in an artist to make these very fun creatures. Kids can band together to walk these dragons, and they have been paraded down the hallways. (I have to assume there has been an uptick in the number of dragon books checked out – or maybe the art books!)

There are, of course, all kinds of books in this library for everyone to enjoy. These books are for younger kids, and are arranged to be easy to find and easy to browse.

As a professional librarian, I still struggle to make sense of the Dewey system – and from years of hearing patrons complain about it, I know it’s not an intuitive way to access materials for most people. So I always like to see libraries using alternative ways to identify the collection and increase usability. I admit I spent a lot of time checking out all these great labels to make the fiction collection easily accessible. When you find a good author, you want to dive in and check out the rest of the books – and these signs make it so easy!

I love to visit elementary schools, and to admire the furniture that is appropriately sized for kid-sized patrons! Plus, you can see the results of a couple of successful grant applications here. On that shelf near the wall are a collection of books on Native American tribes and people, and also a collection on Somali American books. It’s always good to see diversity celebrated in books, especially in schools and with children’s books!

I like this collection of materials – but I have to say it was the plastic wobbly eyes on the covers of these books that really grabbed my attention and made me laugh! (Attention-grabbing is a good characteristic for book displays!)

You can notice two neat things in this photo. First: check out that view!! It’s always great to see plants in a library, and to have all those windows with a lovely view of the courtyard. (And the possibility of an aquaponic garden system coming there is so cool!! I’m so excited about that too!) And notice the neat poster on the book-cart! In a country of immigrants, it’s always good to have some information on that; and in a school where many students may be immigrants themselves, or first or second generation Americans, it seems especially great to have books available and ready to give out information and help everyone to feel like part of the community!

Of course, in any school library, students are not the only patrons. Check out these nice and organized shelves filled with information and materials teachers can use in their classes. Libraries are always there to support the learning mission of their schools – and you can see that front and center! (Plus, you can see all the really nice positive messages painted along the walls near the ceiling. This extends down both sides of this runway in the library from end to end – a stream of positivity!)

Like all libraries, Talahi has enthusiastically embraced technology! Their TinkerSpace is just cool – filled with fun tech projects of all sorts, and kids who are enthusiastically building great things!

Check out this one example of an exciting project! A student showed me the different Lego designs he was creating – and then using the software to bring them to life!! This smaller version was on its way to the TIES conference.

Larger projects, including a moving Ferris wheel and a rover vehicle, were moving around the desk and were being readied for their (then) upcoming STEM community program!! It was pretty cool to see kids building and programming, and then making changes to their designs, right there in the library!

The computer lab is available for instruction just off the main part of library. It really is good to see the kid-sized furniture; and to hear about the coding work even the youngest students are doing here. Coding, and technology literacy, will be just as valuable for students as the information literacy they should be learning in libraries – and it’s exciting to see that process in action!

And how can you not love this: a TNT Lab, Where Ideas Explode! It was so exciting to see all the pictures of kids with their projects, and to see the Legos exploding all over the wall!! You can see that this room, near the library, is designed for creative fun – the very best way to learn STEAM skills! (Yes, I wanted to stop and build some fun stuff; no, I didn’t beg to let me play with their stuff. It was a struggle though!)

And I just loved this. As an instructor for many years myself, I am a big believer in teaching perseverance and reliance above all other skills.  Having that so excitingly graphically portrayed here was just cool!! I had a pretty good third grade experience, but I have to tell you – this one looks kind of amazing from my view of the library! It was hard to leave, but the staff here needed to get back to the work they are doing with kids! (It didn’t stop the entire time I was there, with a continuing parade of kiddos running up to ask for help with an assortment of different tasks – so fantastic to see!!)

Have we been to your library yet? We would love to come and admire the good work you are doing!! All 300+ of our many different types of libraries, archives, and history centers are doing different stuff – but we are all focused on making providing the best materials and services and programs to our communities. It is so valuable to see how different places approach this fundamental mission of ours – so we are looking forward to adding your work to our bank of information! Read about all our library visits here!