I am about to finish my first year as a real full-time librarian.  While my education was invaluable in starting my career as a YA librarian, it definitely did not prepare me for everything.  I have learned a lot this year and am looking forward to applying these skills to next year.

First off, kids have too much energy.  They like to be sassy towards authority figures.  I expected some of this, but not to the extent I experienced it.  I now have a very solid set of rules displayed and all of the kids and adults are subject to them.  No matter what.  I let one kid bargain with me once and it ruined the next two weeks.  I know when to be lenient and when to be harsh.  Most importantly, the teens now know exactly what my rules are and that they will be kicked out if they don’t follow them. (more…)

Have some Teen Tech Geeks in your school or public library? Use Teen Tech Week as an opportunity for these teen geeks to demonstrate and promote their tech skills and knowledge.

Suggested activities for your teen geeks are:

1. Teach or demonstrate a new application in a class or as a program in the public library.

2. Create an instructional video/podcast on how to use a particular application.

3. Participate globally in projects/competitions such as Thinkquest or GlobalSchoolNet or TakingITGlobal

4. Become “curators” and create pathfinders and curation pages for research projects.

Register for Teen Tech Week and promote your teen tech geeks!

This episode’s guest is Erin Knight, Learning Director for the Mozilla Foundation. Erin walks us through all the ins and outs of Mozilla’s new education initiative Badges for Lifelong Learning, a developing system that will enable users to highlight and gain recognition for specialized learning and achievements outside the standard classroom or workplace.

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

If  you prefer, you may go to the YALSA Podcast Site, download the Mp3 file and listen to it on the Mp3 player of your choice. To avoid missing future episodes, add the feed to Itunes or any other rss feed tracker.

For more information on the program you can visit the project website openbadges.org. Please also check out the Digital Media and Learning Competition for proposals issued by a number of different organizations, including YALSA, for different ways of using the project.

Thanks for listening!

“There’s something in my library to offend everyone.”

So read a favorite t-shirt of Dorothy Broderick, a legend in YA librarianship, a great defender of intellectual freedom, and an unforgettable personality. Dorothy died Saturday, Dec. 17, at 8:45 p.m.

Dorothy  was an active member of ALA, including YALSA. Her work was recognized repeatedly in the library field, from the prestigious Robert B. Downs Intellectual Freedom Award in 1987 to the Grolier Award from ALA in 1991 and the Freedom to Read Foundation’s Roll of Honor Award in 1998.

Dorothy’s greatest contribution to YA librarianship, however, is the mentoring and personal guidance she gave to hundreds of librarians throughout her career, as a librarian in the field, a professor at five major library schools, an author, and through her work as editor of VOYA (co-founded with her partner, Mary K. Chelton, in their home in 1978).

YALSA and YA librarianship wouldn’t be what it is today without Dorothy. The YALSA Board of Directors offered a resolution in her honor in 2007, calling her “the glue that that bound many of us together in earlier YALSA years,” and noting her “wicked wit,” which belied a “a heart of gold, a brilliant mind, a love of librarianship, [and] a strong sense of right and wrong.”

In my early days in YALSA, in the 1990s, Dorothy was still attending conferences. It was always a delight to see her, and to hear her asides about whatever was going on at the time. Dorothy was also one of the first editors to publish my writing—articles and reviews in VOYA–so I am personally grateful to her. I’m so glad I had the opportunity to know her and work with her.

She will be missed, but never forgotten.  The Board of Directors, and all of YALSA, are grateful to Dorothy for everything she gave to YA librarianship. Our thoughts are with Mary K. and their family.

Sarah Flowers, YALSA President

A weekly short list of tweets that librarians and the teens that they serve may find interesting.

Do you have a favorite Tweet from the past week? If so add it in the comments for this post. Or, if you read a Twitter post between December 16 – December 22 that you think is a must for the next Tweets of the week send a direct or @ message to lbraun2000 on Twitter.
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Title: Michael Jackson The Experience

Cost:  $4.99
Platform: iPad: requires iOS 4.2 or later

When Michael Jackson The Experience came out for Xbox Kinect every teen in my library wanted to give it a whirl, but some were too shy to shake it in front of their peers. This excellent iPad app is a great alternative for teens who just aren’t comfortable doing their best rendition of “Thriller” in front of an audience. In this format, they can let their fingers do the dancing and save themselves some humiliation, all while taking part jamming out to MJ’s classic hits like “Beat It,” “Smooth Criminal,” “Blood on the Dance Floor, “and much more. Don’t see your favorite song included in the game? No worries, you can download other songs through the in-app purchase function.

The game functions by using your fingers to make a series of swipes across the screen, following the prompts for each impending dance move. When this happens, the Michael Jackson avatar comes to life and performs real Michael Jackson signature moves. Thankfully, the game is not sensitive to how large you make the signs or where on the screen you make them; just as long as you perform the correct “swipe motion,” your move will be properly executed. The animation and game graphics are amazing and will not let you down. (more…)

I’ve been thinking about the past year’s news stories that have an impact on teens and the library service we provide to them. The Storify below highlights a few (it is far from everything) of the stories that have captured librarian and/or teen attention. What 2011 news stories do you think are important to teens and librarians? If you have something to add, post it in the comments.
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For a lot of school librarians, celebrating Teen Tech Week can present some steep challenges. Not every librarian teaches classes, or has a designated time with their students to demonstrate and create, leaving tech programming a little up in the air. Many may not even see the point in celebrating– “If I only have the kids when they stop in for five minutes each day to print, how can I show off this really cool cloud tool or have them make an awesome podcast?”

If you find yourself in the “I want to, but when” boat, never fear! Here are some easy ways to integrate technology into your library for the week without disrupting classes or running yourself ragged. (more…)

Close your eyes for a moment and imagine this photo as approximately 18X24 in the teen space at your library.The photo is framed and hanging on a wall. Okay, you can open your eyes now. It’s a bit hard to describe because the size influences the effect it can have and posting it on a blog doesn’t necessarily do it justice. If I had to describe it in one word, I might choose the word ‘radiant’. As librarians, we’re constantly existing in worlds that might not seem all that real to others, so I’m confident that you’re quite on board with this and we’ll keep moving on. (more…)

A weekly short list of tweets that librarians and the teens that they serve may find interesting.

Do you have a favorite Tweet from the past week? If so add it in the comments for this post. Or, if you read a Twitter post between December 9 – December 15 that you think is a must for the next Tweets of the week send a direct or @ message to lbraun2000 on Twitter.
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