Category Archives: General

Check this out:, General, Resources, School Media Specialist, Tech

AASL Recommended App: Content Creation: Spark Page

Adobe-SparkIn June 2016, the American Association of School Librarians (AASL) announced their 25 Best Apps for Teaching and Learning. The apps encourage qualities such as innovation and active participation, and are user-friendly.

The app Spark Page is a web publishing tool that allows users to create digital magazines with motion. The app offers a variety of fonts and design templates, and allows users to use their own images from their camera or Dropbox, or choose from Creative Commons licensed images. Users can create newsletters, reports, projects, portfolios, invitations, and more. The app also includes active buttons, which make it a good choice for fundraisers or registration. Sharing is possible through social media, embedding, texting, or emailing. Take a look at their blog for more fun and practical ideas for ways to use the app.

The app has gotten lots of positive feedback online. This article from Free Tech for Teachers includes a video and several specific examples of ways teachers can incorporate the app in the classroom. Class Tech Tips features this article, which describes ways to use Adobe Spark to create “school stories” or share the events happening in classroom and across the school district.

Cost: Free!
Level: Middle and High School
Platforms: iOS

Check this out:, General, Resources, Training

Let's just take a minute to breathe…

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breathe….blow out the stress, breathe in the relaxation!

This month we are talking about ways to handle stress in your workplace. While working in a library is wonderful in a lot of ways; we all know that it also brings us some stressful moments.

You need to take less than five minutes, right now, and just have some time to breathe and let your mind wander in happy directions. Take a nice deep breath in, hold for a second, and then breath out with gusto. Do this another time or two, and just let your worries fade to the background for a while. (They will be there later; so you can just forget about them for right now!)

Stress reduction can be enhanced by watching nature. So if you are somewhere you can look at fish, stare out the window at some green space, or pat your dog or cat – do that. And if you want to just relax and let nature come to you, we have a nice video of the Acadia National Park in Maine. Let it inspire you to go out after work or over the weekend and do your own walking around in nature, for the best relaxation!

Check this out:, Communication, General, Public, Resources, School Media Specialist

Signing during storytime – webinar review

macmillan-livenup_300indEarlier this week, I was able to attend an ALA webinar called “Liven up Baby and Toddler Storytimes with Sign Language” presented by Kathy Macmillan. I was excited to learn about this topic because I am hoping to learn to communicate through signing with my own little one at home, but also because I know many of our member libraries work with small kids and thought this could be a fun addition to their storytime routine!

Kathy began the presentation by laying out the multiple benefits of including ASL (American Sign Language) in your library programs. There were a ton! Some of which were: kids are able to sign before they can speak, signing stimulates language development, it reduces frustration, and learning one form of communication encourages more communication in general. Plus, signing is an instant way to get kids to participate!

Continue reading Signing during storytime – webinar review →

Check this out:, CMLE, General, Public, School Media Specialist

Orville's Adventure: a slumber party at the library!

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Are you looking for a fun library activity to engage youngsters at your library or media center? Last week, CMLE’s own Office Bear Orville was able to participate in a fantastic event at the St. Cloud Public Library – the Stuffed Animal Sleepover!

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There is Orville, surrounded by furry friends! (They are wearing superhero capes, just one of the event’s activities!)

Mary was able to represent CMLE at the event, and accompanied Orville as he got to meet the other stuffed friends and their chaperones, heard a story, then had some fun with crafting superhero capes and necklaces. Then it was time to say goodnight to the stuffed animals and leave them for the night, with instructions to “be good!” Library staff then got to work documenting all the mischief the stuffed animals created in the library!

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Orville enjoyed playing with legos!

While we have several fun pictures to share with you here, we also have some exciting printed ones at CMLE HQ. Some of these include Orville riding Wally, the huge book sorting machine that is behind the scenes at the library, and also a picture of Orville and assorted friends working together to break into the Executive Director’s office! The printed photos of library shenanigans were distributed to each child when they arrived the next morning to pick up their stuffed friend. The kids got to enjoy a snack while they heard all about the adventures of the previous night, while admiring the picture display set up in the Children’s Department of all the stuffed animals and their troublemaking!

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Orville had fun exploring!

 

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He got to make new friends, too!

For the past four years, Dezra Rittmann has brought this awesome event to life, and works very hard to make sure kids and stuffed animals enjoy themselves! She describes it as a very popular program, and it’s easy to see why. In fact, it is so popular that registration is required!

CMLE had so much fun taking part in this event, and we think that it could be a great program for your library, too! Especially with school libraries or media centers – kids would love to see what mischief their stuffed animals get into after the school is closed! Let us know if you need more information, and we can connect you with the right people!

A huge thank-you to Dezra and everyone at the St. Cloud Public Library for letting us participate in your program!

Check this out:, CMLE, Communication, General, Tech

CMLE's web redesign week is Dec. 14th – 20th, stop in and say hello!

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Snowmen and Sound of Music candles at CMLE HQ!

Here at CMLE Headquarters, we have eagerly been awaiting the chance to dive in and make some changes and improvements to our website. Mid-December would be the perfect time to do that! During the week of Dec. 14th – 20th, we will be here at HQ devoting our focus to website redesign. We are sharing this information with you in case you have some suggestions for the updated website! Is there anything you’d like to see more of, certain features that would make the site more accessible, or templates that you find especially useful? Let us know! Email us or feel free to stop in during our week of web redesign.

holiday-3Since we love the holiday season, if you do stop in, we will show you around our decorated space and share some yummy treats – maybe even some hot chocolate! You can feel free to chat with us about libraries, websites, or your holiday plans.

holiday-2Hope to see you then!