In April, I kicked off a new monthly program series for elementary-aged kids with a stuffed felt Pikachu sewing project. It was the first program I got to completely design myself at my new job. Coincidentally, it was also my first time teaching kids how to sew. Read on to see what I did and how it went.
Continue reading “Program-And-Tell: Felt Pikachu”
Leaving my previous job in December 2021 meant saying goodbye to the tween book group I had been facilitating since 2018. March 2022 would have been four years! By the time I’d left, most of my original crew had aged out. This made it a little easier to leave, but it was still hard for me to say goodbye. With the job transition, I never posted my last year of titles and activities. Time to dust off this blog and share!
Continue reading “2021 Tween Book Group Activities”To say 2020 was strange doesn’t even begin to cover it. But it was definitely an odd year for tween (ages 9-12) book group. First, book group stopped like everything else. We weren’t allowed to hold any programs, not even virtual. Then we brought it back via Zoom, but only with books with eBook or eAudiobook versions in Library2Go or Hoopla. In August, we found our groove (and grant funding) to provide book group boxes that we mailed to participants in advance of the Zoom discussion. As of this writing, we’ve done these book group boxes now for a whole year. (I’ll talk more about the process behind creating those in a separate post.)
Continue reading “2020 Tween Book Group Activities”I’ve been leading Tween Book Group for over two years now and it remains my favorite program of all time. Why? Because there’s nothing more fun than helping kids build relationships with literature—and, of course, each other.
Our hour-long Tween Book Group is structured with about half the time devoted to discussion and half the time devoted to an extension activity. I really try to make it feel like a club, so I’ll often make and give away custom swag (typically buttons). But my signature move is drawing a whiteboard schedule based on the book. And one of my tweens’ signature moves is erasing bits of my whiteboard masterpiece at the end of the program.
In June, our library’s long-standing monthly Tween Book Group passed down to me. I was super nervous when I led my first program, because I had never led a book group for young people before. Not only is it now my favorite program, but I have since started a few other programs for tweens—they’re the best!
Tween Book Group is structured with about half the time devoted to discussion and half the time devoted to an extension activity. The program lasts and hour and, honestly, it never feels like there’s enough time!
The Stories Guy 