CSLA--Saturday

Saturday morning we started off at 8 with concurrent sessions. The first I attended was "Books, Blogs, and the Ties that Bind." Library science students, are you interested in helping set up an online book club? If there is enough interest, we'll do it. The next session was "School Library Learning 2.0: California's Summer Fun." This was for the people who participated last summer in a self-paced online course on web 2.0 for libraries. It was fun to see the faces of the people we knew only by screen names. I signed up to be a cheerleader for people who take the course this winter. My final session for the day was called "Booktalks: a Blueprint for Building Readers." I served as facilitator for the session. (That means I introduced the speaker, made sure people got handouts, gave the presenter a gift from CSLA, and collected evaluations at the end. If there had been any technical problems, it would have been my job to get help.) Booktalks are one of the skills we will be developing in the spring semester. The presenter also had a handout on books for people who liked A Child Called "It." I frequently get requests like that, so now I have ideas for my next book-buying expedition.

Speaking of buying books, I bought the CYRM books for both primary and young adults, as well as some others that were just too good to pass up. There will be cataloging to do when I get back to school.

Later in the afternoon we gathered for the membership meeting. This was a chance for members to express concerns and get feedback from the officers. The day ended with the CYRM Award Banquet. The speaker was supposed to be Karen Hesse, whose books some of you have been reading. She was unable to attend, but the illustrator of her picture book for older youth, The Cats in Krasinski Square spoke to us about how she and Ms Hesse collaborated on the book and how she did the research for the book. It was an interesting evening.