All posts by Angie

Academic, General, Public, School Media Specialist, Special

Bookish acronyms cheat sheet

sitting on booksWhile perusing book-related sites, do you ever come across an acronym you just cannot understand?

Luckily, this article can easily be bookmarked and saved for future reference, so when you come across a book categorized as “GN YA PNR” you can figure out that it’s a Graphic Novel for Young Adults in the genre of ParaNormal Romance.

The article breaks the acronyms into sections for easy use, including: general reading, genre and demographics, organizations and event related, formats, and fun stuff.

Image credit:  https://unsplash.com/(Gaelle Marcel), licensed under CC0 1.0
Academic, General, Public, School Media Specialist, Special

In case you missed it – new library and author-talk event

We had a wonderful time at our event on May 5th that took place at the new St. Cloud Technical and Community College library!

Writer Jess Lourey started us out with an engaging presentation, walking us through her life and the events that led to her becoming a published author. Lourey grew up with stories, and she spoke about her high school English teacher who encouraged her writing. When receiving an award years later in her hometown of Paynesville, her teacher shared that he had actually saved one of her short stories, knowing she had talent and would become successful. Lourey’s path hasn’t been easy – her first novel was rejected over 400 times and she faced tragedy in her personal life. However, through the power of story, she was able to channel some of those situations and feelings into her writing. Lourey has written YA, magical realism, and her thriller Salem’s Cipher is scheduled to be released in September this year. She is also an award-winning professor of creative writing and sociology at St. Cloud Community and Technical College. Lourey will be presenting a TEDx talk about her upcoming book Better Than Gin: Rewrite Your Life, about the power of narrative therapy through fiction writing. Check back with us, we will keep you posted with where to find her TED talk.

ebooks minnesotaBeth Staats from Minitex gave a great presentation about the exciting new venture that is eBooks MN. As we know, our state has a flourishing publishing industry. This platform is taking advantage of that to share the materials with the wider public! You can download the app, and can also download books to read offline, all free of charge. Currently it is estimated 3/5 of the titles are aimed at children, but they are working on increasing their contents for adults. After all, we try to shop and eat local, why wouldn’t we read local too?

Finally, we were able to enjoy some tasty Mexican food and toured the spacious new library facility at the Tech College. Modern furniture, energy-efficient lighting, and comfortable group work areas (plus many additional updates!) all come together to create a fantastic space. You don’t need to be a student to reap the benefits of the library either – they offer library cards to community members! If you haven’t visited yet, go check it out!

Image credit: http://www.sctcc.edu/
General, Public, School Media Specialist

New: The Letters of Laura Ingalls Wilder

letters laura ingalls wilderFans new and old of the Little House on the Prairie series will be excited to learn there is another opportunity to delve into the life of Laura Ingalls Wilder.

William Anderson, a Wilder scholar, has collected over 400 letters from private collections and museums and published The Selected Letters of Laura Ingalls Wilder. The letters were written by Wilder when she was between the ages of 27 and 89. She wrote them to friends, family, and also fans. In this article, you can read an excerpt from a letter to her daughter Rose where she offers a beautifully detailed description of Plum Creek.

In the letters, Wilder also touches on the importance of libraries. Upon having a library in Detroit named after her, she wrote to the community to emphasize the value of books, and how not everyone is lucky enough to have convenient access to a library!

Want more? You can find out more about Wilder’s life in her annotated autobiography, Pioneer Girl, published in 2014.

General, Public, School Media Specialist

New Teen Read Week theme: "Read for the fun of it!"

RainbowEncouraging teens to read can itself be a challenge. But what about inspiring a love of reading in teens that speak a language other than English?

YALSA is addressing this issue with their multilingual “Read for the fun of it” theme during Teen Read Week, October 9–15. According to their 2016 Teen Read Week website, 22% of the nation’s youth speak a language other than English at home. This year’s Teen Read Week poster features the theme in the six most spoken languages in the US: English, Chinese (Mandarin), French, Spanish, Vietnamese, and Tagalog.

YALSA encourages libraries to highlight services and resources for multilingual teens. Eligible library staff, afterschool providers, and educators can now apply for a YALSA 2016 Teen Read Week Activity Grant to support activities aimed at youth that speak English as a second language

Use the hashtag #TRW16 to join the conversation on social media!

Image credit: http://tinyurl.com/omzxm4x, licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 2.0
Academic, General, Public, School Media Specialist, Special

Collections, events, and makerspace funding ideas!

Are you looking to update your school library collection? Maybe put on an event that promotes literacy, reading, or authors? Both of these opportunities come from AASL, but happily they do not require a membership. Read on for details and links to apply:

  • Inspire Collection Development Grant
    • This grant is intended to help public middle or high schools “extend, update, and diversify the book, online subscription and/or software collections” in order to increase student learning and achievement
    • Award amount: direct assistance grant capped at $5,000
    • Deadline: May 23, 2016
  • Inspire Special Event Grant
    • The goal of this grant is to assist public middle or high schools “create new or enhance educational activities in order to engage students within the library and to promote books, reading, literacy, and authors.”
    • Award amount: direct assistance grant capped at $2,000
    • Deadline: May 23, 2016

Have a great idea for a makerspace, or even just a classroom project? Check out these sites for grants to help fund your enterprise:

  • MakerSpace Lab Grants Page
    • This page features 16 different makerspace grant opportunities in amounts ranging from $500 – $75,000! They also have some non-monetary grants that award Adobe software and e-subscriptions to news services.
  • e-School News Funding Section
    • Check out this link to 14 different crowdfunding sites specifically geared towards classrooms. They also have some helpful tips before deciding on a site to use, which includes looking at who uses the platform, the pricing structure, and what features are included (in this case, less can be more.) Remember, there’s really no limit to how much you can raise!

Remember that CMLE wants to help fund your projects for your library, school or classroom! Check out our grants page here. 

Image credit: https://unsplash.com/, licensed under CC0 1.0