This week’s featured program from the Young Adult Literature Symposium is Celebramos Libros: Celebrating Latino Literature!
This week’s featured presenter is Teri S. Lesesne, Professor of Library Science, Sam Houston State University, Huntsville, TX.
KH: Who should come to your presentation?
TL: Anyone interested in learning more about adding diversity to their collections for tweens and teens, who wants to have the chance to hear authors (Ben Saenz and Margarita Engle), who wants to learn about why books about another culture are essential to the collection.
KH: How will people be able to use the information you share in their own practice?
TL: They will be able to identify the books that need to be a part of the collection so that patrons have both mirrors (books in which they can see themselves) and windows (books that open the world to them and show them other people and places).
**The complete interview can be found at the YA Lit Symposium Online Community.
The YA Literature Symposium is November 5-7 in Albuquerque, NM. To give everyone a sneak peek into the presentations I be posting portions of interviews with program presenters weekly until the symposium. Full interviews will be available at the YA Lit Symposium Online Community.
Over the past couple of years location-based applications have become more and more popular with those using mobile devices. The idea of these apps is that from a mobile device a user can check-in and tell others where he or she is – a movie theatre, a store, a restaurant, a library, and so on. The people behind the location-based services make the check-in worth the user’s time because of the game-like features and virtual and non-virtual incentives integrated into the apps. For example, with brightkite the person with the most check-ins at a particular location gets to be mayor of that location. Establishments that know how brightkite works can offer rewards to mayors. For example, a library might give the brightkite mayor of the institution a discount on copying costs. With FourSquare user rewards come in the form of badges. For example, a FourSquare user can check into a specific Starbucks a certain number of times and earn the barista badge. Mayorships and badges appear in the user’s profile on the service. That means others can learn about the rewards earned. Rewards can also be announced via Twitter and other social networks. As I mentioned in a 2008 blog post, the possibilities for location-based applications in library services to teens are many.
Now there’s a new way to check-in, and that’s application and web-based tools that give users the chance to check-in when participating in an entertainment related activity – reading a book, watching a TV show, viewing a movie, and so on.
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The other day a post on The New York Times Bits Blog told the story of the post author, Nick Bilton, who was told, on two separate occasions in two separate New York City eating establishments, that he needed to put away his Kindle and his iPad. Each establishment doesn’t allow computer use. The first time it happened to Mr. Bilton he was reading on his Kindle – not using a computer for email, work, Facebook, or something of that nature. The second time he was taking notes on his iPad. (Which of course is a bit more like computing.)
When I read Bilton’s story I thought to myself, “My gosh, I think if I were told that I couldn’t use my iPad to read while in a coffee shop, or my iPad to take notes, while in a sandwich shop, I would probably become pretty irritated.” (more…)
