Program Kits for Summer Bookmobile Pop-Ups

Two summers ago, I wrote about our forays into pop-up programming for the summer. I mentioned in that post that I'd be assessing this volunteer-staffed, in-the-library, weekly activity model for the following summer, and my youth program team and I definitely considered all aspects of the program. What we ended up with last summer was an in-library program schedule with a much higher volume of activities--which meant we could focus our pop-up energies elsewhere. And so we did: to the bookmobile. What we discovered last summer is that we can pretty simply pop-up with activities for bookmobile patrons, but we have to provide staffing for every pop-up; our bookmobile staff see such a high volume of patrons at each stop that they can't lend one of their regular staffers to lead an activity.

So for this summer, we considered what we'd learned, then iterated again. For 2017, we're sending activities out to the bookmobile once again. Since we know providing staffing is vital, and scheduling staff can be difficult during the summer, we needed to be really flexible to ensure that any staff member could confidently and competently lead a pop-up program with the bookmobile, little advance training necessary. And so we created Bookmobile Program Kits, each with video instructions that we can play at the pop-up.

Ribbon Cutting for New Bookmobile by Skokie Public Library, CC BY-NC-SA 2.0

See, we got a magnificent new bookmobile a little over a year ago. This gorgeous library on wheels boasts an exterior awning, under which we can set up a folding table and lead activities. Also under the awning, beneath a panel on the exterior wall of the bookmobile, there is a flat-screen television. Which means we can play videos while we're set up under the awning leading activities. Thus our idea of how-to videos for bookmobile programming was born.

This summer we've got five different bookmobile program kits available, each with a bin full of supplies and a how-to video featuring a library staff member of community volunteer who has experience leading that same activity in a formal library program or space. Our kits, all with a STEAM connection:

• Nature Paints
• Paper Airplanes
• Paper Lotuses
• Pixel Art
• Sharpie Tie-Dye

We've only made a few pop-up appearances with the bookmobile so far this summer, but word is they're going quite well. The short videos help to reinforce to bookmobile patrons that they can participate in the activity even if they only have five minutes--we've found most patrons plan enough time for browsing and checking out books, but don't plan to stay for a longer activity. Staff leading the activities have shared that the kits work well logistically: all the supplies are easily accessible, the activities don't require a huge amount of space for patrons to engage, and the video allows ease of participation even when there's a larger size group of eager participants. And no one forgets how to do an activity, because you have the how-to on a loop.

At this point in the summer, we're considering these Bookmobile Program Kits a success. And a bonus: we didn't specifically brand the how-to videos as pertaining to the bookmobile pop-ups, so we can reuse them in so many potential programs and spaces in the future.

Librarianship on YouTube: How to Make a Volcano

Right now and through the month of April, we're exploring all things earth science in the BOOMbox. That means rocks, natural disasters, ecosystems... all sorts of exciting natural phenomena that are ripe for exploration. One of the hits of the BOOMbox: Earth rotation thus far has been our weekly Monday afternoon microworkshop on volcanos. Who doesn't love a good eruption?

You can find the basics of the microworkshop on the help site for the BOOMbox (click here). And if you want to make your very own volcano, just like ours? Well, lucky you--here's a video that shows you how to do just that, complete with elephant toothpaste eruption.



Don't forget to click through to this volcano frame template if you want to follow along--or feel free to build a volcano that satisfies your own craftiness!

Tabletop Coding, plus more resources for coding with kids from WisCode Literati

I'm a fan of coding and other computer science activities in libraries--and I hope more and more folks will be inspired in this area, too, what with President Obama requesting $4 billion in the next budget specifically for K-12 computer science (CS) education. I love that coding activities are simultaneously versatile and engaging. Also, there's some indication that those activities kids intentionally spend time on are the ones preparing them for future jobs we have yet to even imagine. That's a strong argument for making sure CS and coding are part of library offerings, if you ask me.

In my relatively short career thus far, I've had the opportunity to work in libraries with both limited and advanced tech materials when it comes to kids' programming. What hardware a library has access to certainly factors into what type of computer science programming they can offer, but hardware doesn't have to be correlated with your intent to program around coding. We can get kids started with fundamental coding concepts in plenty of no- and low-tech ways.

All you need for a simple coding
activity is a grid board, some
tokens, and blank index cards.

With that in mind, I put together a Tabletop Coding activity for elementary ages and older. I've offered it as one of a range of stations on our Afternoon of Code here at Skokie, but it can also be a standalone pop-up activity, a competitive program--you name it. The materials are simple: a gridded game board, like for chess or checkers; a few game pieces or other tokens; and 20+ blank index cards, plus a writing utensil. With these simple materials at your fingertips, you can get kids in the mindset for coding. Full details on running the activity are here.

You see, rather than specifically share this full program activity how-to here on the blog, I wrote it up for a tremendous, free coding resource made by and for librarians: WisCode Literati. Their website hosts a growing number of CS activities, called "kits," that cover the full spectrum from no-tech to high-tech activities. Basically, there's something there for every library to offer, regardless of the tech you have at your disposal. Each activity has a thorough description, most often with helpful pictures, to get library staffers at a point where their comfort level matches their enthusiasm for offering coding activities. You should check out all of the great program and activity ideas, all of which have been vetted by librarians.

What are some of your favorite coding resources?

Librarianship on YouTube: Milk Planets

Today is the third annual Family Science Expo at my library, and I'll be running one of the staff-led activity stations from our craft room. What type of science will we do in there, you ask? We're doing simple chemistry by making milk planets--colorful, milky reactions that end up looking like gas giants!

Watch the video below to find out how to do this simple activity yourself using some basic household materials.

Star Wars Sticky Note Mosaic Murals

We celebrated Star Wars at my library this weekend. It was my first time being immediately involved in a big Star Wars program since my spring break programs in my former job, and while my current library has celebrated Star Wars for a few years now, the goal is to always add some new elements to the festivities. Of course we had some of the expected: trivia; a light saber craft; and a seek-and-find scavenger hunt. We also repeated using the green screen in our youth Digital Media Lab to take family photos and insert them into Star Wars backgrounds.

What was totally new this year, however, was the main activity taking place in the BOOMbox, our STEAM space: Sticky Note Mosaic Murals.

My colleague Amy Holcomb, who runs the BOOMbox, emailed me a few weeks back with a news article about a paper company, Viking Direct, that created such murals on their office walls. I looked at those pictures (and looked harder), and from there I created a 25-by-25 sticky note grid template in Excel, on which I designed Darth Vader and Yoda images. The individual grid templates are pictured below if you're interested.

To make this activity work, one of my program assistants broke each 25-by-25 mural into 5-by-5 squares; these squares each had a designated spot on a grid, allowing a child/teen to take one grid square "map," gather their requisite sticky notes, and place their sticky note mosaic squares into the proper section of the full grid, which was measured out with string and tape on the glass BOOMbox windows. We had a grid on one window for the Light Side of the Force, and another on the opposite window for the Dark Side. The grid square "maps" are linked here if you'd like to use them to do this collaborative mosaic wall activity yourself (Light Side link; Dark Side link).

To create both the Vader and Yoda mosaic murals, you will need:

• 7.5'x7.5' wall or window space for EACH mural
• string, tape, and a measuring device to mark out your full grid, as well as paper or sticky notes to label the rows and columns (picture of the grid set-up below)
• Sticky notes for Yoda: 295 blue; 219 green; 54 yellow; 34 orange; 16 gray; 7 black
• Sticky notes for Vader: 304 black; 243 blue; 78 gray

As kids and teens came into the BOOMbox for the activity, they could choose if they wanted to help with the Light Side or the Dark Side. From there, we gave them a grid square map that would be within their reach--that is, lower squares for shorter, younger kids, and higher squares for taller teens. We were able to help explain the map-to-wall process as needed, but most kids jumped into the activity with a decent understanding of how to read their maps and add to the wall.

Our Vader mosaic mural in progress.

Note: because of the height at which our windows begin, I chopped the bottom row off of both grids for our particular activity. Were we to repeat this activity on a bare wall, however, I'd start with the bottom of the grid touching the carpet and build up from there. I just didn't want the grid to get too high for our activity--no ladders allowed.

Kids really liked this activity, and their caregivers got pretty excited about it, too. It was great fun to overhear conversations about what kids thought the murals would be while they were in early stages--each mural got pieced together one square at a time, making it a cool puzzle to solve.

Once our mosaic murals were completed, kids were welcome to come in the space to admire them and to create origami Yodas under the gaze of sticky note Yoda himself. Quite a fun way to weave our current BOOMbox theme--textiles--into our larger Star Wars Extravaganza!

Have you done any of these cool sticky note murals before? Care to share your plans?

Equity for Learning: Notes from the Public Libraries & STEM Conference

I'm back again to share my last big takeaway from the Public Libraries & STEM Conference, which I attended in August. As I've mentioned earlier, the conference was small and thus very concentrated. That meant tons of robust ideas throughout the entire 3 days, with lots to chew on and mull over. I've already shared a few takeaways with regard to training and collaboration; today I want to share what I heard, discussed, and thought about programs/services and equity.

To quickly reiterate, one of the major goals of the conference was to help define a new 21st Century vision of STEM in public libraries. For me, it goes without saying that anything having do to with the 21st Century is going to necessarily have a massive amount of thought around how diversity fits in. Our country is getting more diverse, the wealth gap grows, and as public-serving institutions we need to take that into account in what we do and offer.

My three major takeaways from the conference had to do with training (blog post recap here); collaboration (blog post recap here); and equity, which is the topic of today's post.

Susan Hildreth, from IMLS and a fellow of the Aspen Institute, gave a keynote address that focused on the outcomes report of the Aspen Institute Dialogue on Public Libraries. The report emphasizes that the future of libraries is intertwined with the library acting simultaneously as people, place, and platform. Libraries are the individuals who make it up and live its values; libraries are the physical spaces they are and offer; and libraries are a platform for those we serve and what they care about.

A problem right now, says Hildreth, is that many of the people we purport to serve do not see us in this way. They may see us as outdated, as so many alarmist "The library is dying because who needs books anymore?!" articles will lead people to believe. They may see us as irrelevant to them and their needs because of their preconceptions about what we do and do not do, whom we do and do not serve. That's a problem, in no small part because we do do so much more than the general consciousness understands. So, says Hildreth, "We need to invent a new nostalgia for libraries, because the existing one is really hurting us." It is up to us to iterate and prove what we do now, whom we serve.

To do that as a profession, Hildreth says, we need to do a few key things. We need to align ourselves with community goals. We need to have sustainability in our communities. And we need to cultivate leadership so that we will institutionally continue to challenge what we are and what we can be.

In terms of relating to our communities and aligning with their goals, I found one particular statement from Lee Rainie at the Pew Research Center to be indicative of the momentum we can seize. According to Pew and its 2015 report which will be publicly released imminently, Rainie said that there is a clear trend of the public favoring making community and learning spaces in libraries by moving some materials out of public view. Think about that. The public is okay with us relocating some materials--not totally getting rid of them, but relocating them--in order to create spaces for community engagement and learning. Frank translation: THE PUBLIC IS COOL WITH US BEING NOT JUST ABOUT BOOKS. Take that, alarmist articles. So how do we respond?

In terms of the learning experiences and programming we offer, we need to recognize that learning is inherently social. People do it together, they do it on their own time, they do it for their own interest and motivations. And they do it in any number of ways.

We at the conference were encouraged to think about this through John Seely Brown's model of the whole person. A whole person is comprised of three parts: a person who knows; a person who makes; and a person who plays. Libraries have arguably always been pretty good at serving the person who knows, but what about those makers and players? Are we serving them? How? And, most importantly, are we actually serving every whole person, or are we primarily serving the whole persons who fit our notions of an exemplary library user?

By and large, I think that libraries--whether intentionally or not--serve a "typical" patron. But this typical patron is not representative of the breadth and diversity of our communities. It was published after the conference, but this piece "Why We Need Diverse Libraries" by Rachel Smalter Hall comes right out and says that libraries are often biased toward serving one type of patron, at the expense and disservice of everyone else. This is where equity starts to come into play.

How can we begin to really reach these underserved communities and underrepresented populations in our service area? According to Maddie Zeigler, an educational consultant to moderated a panel at the conference, we can start to do so through programs that satisfy a few key components. We can build trust with our communities through planning programs with them, as opposed to strictly for them; who better to know what they want and need than them? We can offer family events which allow entire families to participate together, a model that is much more culturally inclusive than a drop-off-your-kid-and-come-back-later model. We can articulate the educational value of our programs, which in turn can equip families of all backgrounds to determine what they want their kids involved in based on the benefits to them. We can also make programs culturally relevant and personally meaningful; why on earth would we ever expect a kid to engage in a program that doesn't interest them, and why would we expect all kids to have the same interests? And finally, we can anticipate and troubleshoot the myriad barriers to participation that many families experience when it comes to library programming. Do you find yourself saying that you only reach a certain population of your community in your in-library programs? That means there are barriers to participation to address.

With these general strategies in mind, it is important to recognize that there is an additional component when it comes to reaching elementary and teenage kids. In order to have positive, productive learning experiences at the library (or in any setting), youth need to be able to pursue their own interests. That means that programs and services have to in some way touch on or include those interests. Youth also need to be a part of creating their programs and program outcomes. I think this goes a step beyond the traditional Teen Advisory Board model, in which teens help come up with program topics that the librarian will inject into a standard program format. Instead, this refers to full-on connected learning, in which learning ties to the unique interests, peer interactions, and academic success of each youth. Connected learning works because youth help set the topics, and the format of programs, and the intended outcomes. It allows everyone to engage, and for everyone to experience positive impact.

The end goal of equity in programming means that we transform some of our own institutional expectations for what our programs do. Instead of offering programs that are nice for our communities, we offer programs that are necessary. Instead of talking about program success, we talk about the significance that the program brings to the lives it touches.

While nice and successful are great things to be, necessary and significant speak to the fundamental importance and value of libraries. That's what I want to be doing. What about you?

Training for Learning: Notes from the Public Libraries & STEM Conference

In the latter half of August, I spent several days in Denver, CO, for the inaugural Public Libraries & STEM Conference. It was a new and relatively small conference--grant-funded and led by folks at the Space Science Institute and Lunar & Planetary Institute, with around 160 total participants from public libraries, STEM organizations, institutions of informal learning, and library thinkers and researchers. I was able to attend as representative both of ALSC and of my own library. I'm grateful for that opportunity, because I really learned a TON. Rather, perhaps it's more precise to say that I heard from many smart and inspiring people, which has left me we lots of little nuggets and bigger ideas to chew on. Either way, I want to share some of my biggest takeaways with you.

The conference logo aimed to combine a compass and a road leading to the horizon--a great visual metaphor for finding direction on the pathway of STEM in libraries.

One of the major goals of the conference was to "Help define a new 21st Century vision of STEM in public libraries." To that end, there was a lot of talking about what libraries are currently doing; what STEM institutions are doing; trends in libraries in general; and what libraries are best equipped and poised to do in this realm.

I had three major takeaways (each with minor components, which I'm discussing in each of three posts):

• Don't forget training as a necessary component of adding STEM at the library (which I'm talking about here)
• Collaborate within the larger learning ecosystem for greater collective impact (which I'm talking about on the ALSC blog)
• Equity needs to be part of the equation when thinking about STEM programs and services (which I talk about in another post on this blog)

So let's start with a few givens, several of which John Falk from Oregon State University shared in his opening morning keynote. First, there are over 17,000 libraries in the United States. (An oft-quoted sound bite is that this is a greater number than there are McDonald's restaurants in the U.S., with libraries having around 3000 more locations in this country.)

That's a lot of libraries, as and Lee Rainie from the Pew Research Center shared, we're right up there with firefighters and nurses in terms of community figures with the most public esteem and public favor. So people are favorable toward all those libraries we have in the U.S.

Falk also pointed out that research indicates that the primary reason people engage in STEM learning is to satisfy their personal interest and curiosity. So STEM learning is largely self-motivated, because people have an interest or something they are curious about. Libraries are an excellent place for this, as more and more learning is taking place outside of formal school contexts. Falk quoted that about 3% of a typical American's life is spent in formal schooling--and 97% spent elsewhere. If the library is one of the places that make up "elsewhere," and people are interested in STEM, it would seem to follow that libraries as places for STEM is a serviceable idea.

And this is something that conference organizers and attendees have seen. STAR_Net, a community of practice for libraries doing STEM, did a national survey to see what the state of the field is in this specific area. What they found ties in many ways to preparation, training, and support for the staff who will be implementing STEM in various ways in their libraries. With regard to programming, this survey found that lots of practitioners are looking for off-the-shelf program resources that they can immediately adopt and adapt for their libraries. In terms of training, these same staff are interested in both online and in-person training opportunities to gain content knowledge as well as confidence to offer STEM learning in the library. And finally, it found that staff would like a clearer pathway toward collaborating with community partners when it comes to STEM.

In exploring the survey responses and data from interviews, what becomes more clear is that people say they want more how-to resources. But that statement is just part of the issue, the easiest bit to articulate. The resources are just the front end of the equation; the rest is having interaction with peers and colleagues who can help put those resources into context and practice in practical ways. It's the difference between having a resource manual alone or having a manual and a colleague to go through it with you.

For libraries, STEM practitioners, and folks invested in informal learning in general, this means that we need to refocus some of those energies that we've all been putting into developing our own unique resources. There are plenty of resources available, and the trend of all libraries wanting to create their own from scratch is an instance of reinventing the wheel. A better use of time and energies would actually be to create connections between people and resources that already exist--letting practitioners know what is already available to them rather than asking someone to start from square one.

This comes down to people. What can people do to share what they know, the resources they've created/found/used? David Lankes spoke in his keynote about how libraries themselves are just buildings; as a concept, they are abstractions and thus cannot do anything or have an impact. It is the people in libraries, however, who are real and who can do things and who can create impact. So it's up to people. If practitioners and would-be practitioners of STEM in libraries need to be connected to resources to learn and gain confidence, then it can follow that libraries are the best positioned to help meet this need.

So perhaps my biggest takeaway on this point of training and informal learning is really more of a question: To what extent is it the responsibility of libraries with successful STEM models to train the rest of the profession, especially those without easy access to professional development? If I'm already doing STEM in the library, and as such have garnered experience and created and gathered resources, in what ways it is my responsibility to share my experience and resources with those libraries who haven't had that opportunity, or who are craving more training and context? If we have it, shouldn't we share it? If training as needed, and it is within our capacity to train, shouldn't we train?

I'm inclined to say "yes" to this question in general, although at some point questions of capacity and institutional priorities come into play. But as a general ethos, don't you think our training one another when it's within our power is a good--and in some ways progressive--concept?

Exploring Water & Dissolving in Science Club, Jr.

I led my final Science Club, Jr. program of the summer last week. The program has gotten such a great reputation that we had a huge combo crowd of folks who had registered in advance and folks who showed up day-of with a big interest in participating. And while I need to work with my fellow youth programming staff to work out the finer points of our registration/latecomers/walk-ins policies, I was glad to be able to allow 15 families--not just kids, as per usual--to participate. It was crowded, sure, but everyone was happily engaged in doing science.

In this particular program, I wanted for us to explore some of the properties of water. Or, more specifically, how some substances will or won't dissolve in water. To kick off our program, we shared a read aloud of The Gingerbread Man. This picture book choice may seem odd at first glance, but recall the story: the gingerbread man meets his ultimate demise because he must trust a fox to carry him across a river--a river which would cause him to fall to bits should he try to swim.

Photo by Skokie Public Library (CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)

So we read the story, then we talked about what we observed happening. I was interested to discover that, when we started talking about why the gingerbread man couldn't swim, many children said that if he swam he would have melted. I would not have anticipated that bit of kid logic, although it of course makes sense to me in hindsight. This reasonable misconception opened the door for us to talk about what the word "dissolve" means and to practice saying it.

Photo by Skokie Public Library (CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)

After we had the nuts and bolts of the concept of dissolving substances, we moved to our hands-on experiments. Each station was prepped with the following:

• a bowl of water
• a small cup with salt
• a small cup with fruit punch powder
• a small cup with a few Skittles candies
• a small cup with a piece of graham cracker
• a popsicle stick for stirring

Before we really got to experimenting, we talked about how we could tell that the liquid in our bowls was water. This line of questioning helped reinforce that scientists never drink or eat a substance that they don't know what it is. It's never to early for science safety skills!

The first phase of the experiment was for kids to dump the cup of salt in the water and observe what happened. Kids were invited to stir their mixture with their popsicle sticks if they so desired. End result: the salt dissolves!

Phase two was dumping the fruit punch powder into the water to observe what would happen, again with optional stirring. This time around, only some of the substance dissolved. We were able to tell some dissolved because the water turned the color of the powder, but we could also see some undissolved powder on the bottom of the bowls. This allowed us to introduce the concept of saturation, when no more of a substance can dissolve in a liquid.

Advice: if at all possible, dump the bowls and refill with fresh water at this point.

Photo by Skokie Public Library (CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)

Phase three was placing the Skittles candies in the bottom of the bowl. We just observed to start off, watching what happened to the colors of the candies as they sat in the water. The colors will bleed from the candies, ultimately leaving a white candy at the bottom of the bowl. Before giving everything a stir for good measure--because who can resist, really?--we talked about reasons why the color might come off but the whole candy might not dissolve.

Our fourth and final phase of the experiment was the graham cracker, which most closely resembled the gingerbread man of our story. Once again, after placing the graham cracker in the water we observed. Kids were interested to see how the graham cracker became visibly soggy before ultimately coming apart in pieces. I heard some great parent/child conversations about what this experiment suggests about dunking cookies in milk at home.

All in all, this was a great program--not too messy, easy for antsy young scientists to do the activities more quickly with their caregivers as desired, and a concept that kids encounter but didn't necessarily have the vocabulary to explain. It was a great summer for Science Club, Jr.!

Exploring Gravity in Science Club, Jr.

The majority of programs I've been leading at the library this summer--which is just a small slice of the myriad offerings that come out of the youth department, BOOMbox, and digital literacy specialists--are focused around some aspect of STEAM. I really enjoying figuring out interesting ways to introduce and explore basic STEAM concepts with kids, and last week's Science Club, Jr., was no exception.

In that program, 15 kids and their caregivers got to explore gravity and its effects via a story and a few activities. To prepare, I set up trays for each child containing:

• string (cut to a child's arm length) tied to one paper clip
• two additional paper clips
• a paper towel
• a pipette
• a piece of watercolor paper
• vials of watercolor (prepared with 1 part watercolor concentrate, 10 parts water) in red, yellow, and blue

I start my Science Club, Jr., programs with a group story. The program happens in our craft room, which is on the small side; this means that, with tables set up for our activities, the read aloud happens with kids sitting on the floor and a few chairs in the back for some of the caregivers. Chairs get pushed out of the way when the story is done and hands-on activities begin.

Our story to introduce gravity was Mini Grey's Egg Drop, a tale of an egg who just wants to fly. This is absurd, of course--eggs just drop!--but the story is a great one to talk about and ask questions throughout. It's pacing is perfect for young 3-year-olds to get a sense of what's going to happen to poor egg, but it's never so slow or obvious as to bore the older kids. Read it. It's wonderful.

After the story and talking a bit about gravity, including a demonstration of me dropping different objects from a height to see if, in fact, they all fall, we moved to the activity tables. First up was the string/paper clip activity. I demonstrated holding the end of the string in one hand, arm extended, and holding the paper clip end of the string by my nose. I then let go of the paper clip, causing it to swing downward and move the string like a pendulum. I counted how many times the string moved back and forth before it came to a rest--until the force of gravity was stronger than the momentum of back-and-forth. I then had kids do the same.

Kids reported how many times their strings had swung with a single paper clip, and I asked caregivers to help kids keep track of their number. Next we added a second paper clip to the first, repeating the experiment a second time. After counting the number of swings before that two-paper-clip-string stopped moving, we added a third paper clip for our final experiment trial. Kids gleefully shared their decreasing numbers as paper clips were added--allowing us to infer that as heavier items stop moving more quickly, gravity's relative effects can depend on the weight (mass) of an object.

I like to conclude, whenever possible, with an activity that includes some take-away component, so we closed out our exploration of gravity with some gravity painting. To paint using gravity, kids learned how to use their pipettes to pull the watercolors from the vials and drop them onto the top of their watercolor paper, which they or a caregiver held perpendicular to the paper towel-lined tray. With the paper standing up straight and watercolor dropped at the top of the page, gravity pulls the paint downward in a line--effectively doing the "painting" for you. I was thrilled to see kids starting to figure out that they could make lines in different directions by rotating their papers, and I even had a few kids who rotated their papers while paint was dripping. By using red, yellow, and blue paints, kids also had the opportunity to talk about mixing primary colors, which reinforced an earlier Science Club, Jr., program.

All in all, we had a great time exploring gravity. I was pleased to hear several of the attending families continuing to talk out in the youth department about gravity and how it pulls objects toward the earth, and plenty of kids said they were excited to take their gravity paintings home to show additional family and friends. Success!

Exploring Bubbles in Science Club, Jr.

Our science adventure opportunities for preschool-age children have continued at my library this summer, with seasonal additions of weekly Nature Play (outdoor sensory play time) and Tour the Sensory Garden (hands-on garden explorations) programs that have been quite well attended. We've also continued to offer Science Club, Jr., as a monthly offering. In our most recent Science Club, Jr. program, we explored bubbles.

To prepare for this program, I gathered:

• 18 small bubble containers, to which I added a few drops of watercolor colorant;
• white paper; 
• one massive jug of bubbles;
• a sleeve of chenille sticks;
• some plastic food container lids; and
• plenty of paper towels for inevitable drips and spills.

We kicked off our exploration of bubbles with a story: Big Bad Bubble by Adam Rubin, illustrated by Daniel Salmieri. This delightful picture book suggests that, when a bubble pops here on Earth, it doesn't just disappear--it reappears in La La Land, where the monsters find bubbles terrifying. This fun, obviously fictional, story provides lots of opportunities for talking about what kids know about bubbles, making observations, etc. And a little bit of humor can go a long way to starting a program off well.

Our first hands-on activity was to see what bubbles leave behind when they do pop. I placed sheets of white paper and the small containers of now-colored bubbles on each table, and kids were instructed to blow their bubbles onto their papers. Note: instruct caregivers to hold the bubble containers while their kids dip the bubble wands and blow bubbles, as otherwise spills are guaranteed. As kids blew their bubbles onto the white paper and the bubbles popped, they saw the various shapes and sizes, now in color, that the bubbles left behind. Abstract bubble art!

Our second hands-on activity was to see if we could blow bubbles in shapes that are not spheres. We talked about circles and spheres, then I gave each child a chenille stick to bend into another shape. These chenille sticks--now in the form of bubble wands with triangle, square, heart, and moon-shaped heads--were then dipped into pans of bubble solution I had set on the tables. We had a bit of a bubble party as kids with different shaped wands took turns demonstrating the bubbles they were creating. Much to the kids' delight, this activity shows that no matter the shape of the bubble wand, bubbles are spheres. Note: I highly recommend ending your program with this activity, or doing it outside if possible, as the floor is a bit of a slippery mess after all the blowing of bubbles around the room.

Thus ended our exploration of bubbles in Science Club, Jr. The topic seemed particularly apt to kick off the summer (this program happened early in June), and I heard many families say they'd be experimenting with bubbles at home as a result of attendance.

Exploring Colors in Science Club, Jr.

For the past few months, I've been offering Science Club, Jr. programs here at Skokie. These programs, aimed at children ages 3-5 with an accompanying caregiver, take place in our youth craft room, which boasts laminate floors, counters, and a sink. It's the perfect space to get a little bit messy, y'all!

And that's what we've been doing as families become accustomed to this new program offering: getting hands-on (and a tad bit messy) with some science. Because the room is quite snug with 15 kids and their caregivers, I've reformatted the Preschool Science programs that I used to do in Missouri for a different space. In Science Club, Jr., we focus on a main topic of the day. We first explore that topic with a story, talking about our topic as we go. Then it's time for the hands-on experimentation, which brings the program to 30 minutes.

This month, we explored colors in Science Club, Jr. As we waited for our scientists to trickle into the program space, we all talked about our favorite colors. Then we shared a story: Hervé Tullet's Mix It Up! Have you read it? If not, you're probably familiar with Press Here, the great interactive picture book also by Tullet. Mix It Up! boasts lots of the same interactive aspects while also exploring how colors mix together--specifically, what happens when primary colors combine. One thing I love about the book is that it reinforces the learning about secondary colors by having kids guess what will happen several times. It's not tedious, I promise; rather, it's perfect for a group of kids whose familiarity with colors may vary.

From there, I had the young scientists put on their smocks just in case things got really messy. Then it was experiment time. I had prepped our new indestructible test tubes so that each child would have access to tubes of red, yellow, and blue water (made with liquid food coloring; only 1 drop of blue per tube, please). I had also stocked each workstation with four empty cups for mixing colors, as well as a one-page, both-sides observation sheet on which the kids could record their experiments. There was room for four experiments: mixing red and yellow; mixing yellow and blue; mixing blue and red; and mixing any two (or more!) colors the child might choose. The observation sheet showed two empty tubes and one empty cup for each experiment; kids could use the appropriate colors of crayons to color in the tubes to show what colors they mixed, and then to color in the cup to show what color resulted.

Kids had so much fun getting to mix primary colors to create new colors they also recognized. Many of the kids seemed to enjoy the process of recording their experiments by coloring in the observation sheets, too. I tried to prompt the caregivers, who assisted their young scientists in the experiments, to ask thoughtful questions about "What do you think is going to happen?" and "What do observe from mixing the colors," and I have to say I was satisfied with the interactions happening between children and caregivers throughout. Some kids (and caregivers) needed a bit more step-by-step guidance to proceed through the four experiments, but others were pleased as punch to get down to business and try mixing anything and everything. That's a sign of a great scientific exploration, if you ask me: high engagement and interest in what else might happen.

When all was said and done, this was a simple, straightforward, and engaging edition of Science Club, Jr. It used all items we already had on hand: Mix It Up! by Hervé Tullet, plastic test tubes, paper cups, water, liquid food coloring, and crayons. The only thing I needed to make from scratch was the observation sheet, which you're more than welcome to access for yourself here.

If you offer this program, or some other permutation on exploring the science of colors with young children, I'd love to hear how it goes for you. I've also previously offered a Preschool Science program on colors, which you can read about here.

How I've Done Preschool Science: A Q&A

Over the few years since I started offering Preschool Science programs at my previous job, and in particular as I started blogging about those programs for the ALSC Blog, I've gotten a bunch of questions from librarians all over asking for some additional details on how I ran those programs. I am always so happy to answer questions about these or other of my programs; why should every programmer have to start from scratch for every program? It's so much more efficient to start with examples of programs that have succeeded at real libraries, culled from whatever sources you prefer.

So, on that note, today I'm sharing a Q&A pertaining to my Preschool Science programs, inspired by some recent questions I've had about theme. I'm referring to the Preschool Science series of programs I started at my previous job in Missouri--I haven't written about my similar programs here at Skokie yet.

And in case you want to check out the program plans/write-ups first, you can find them at the following links:

• Strength and Materials with the Three Little Pigs
• Weather with Bringing the Rain to Kapiti Plain
• Color with White Rabbit's Color Book
• Body Science with Parts
• Water Science with Asch's Water
• Gravity Science with Cosmo Zooms
• Chemistry Science with Whopper Cake
• Science Skills: Observation with Pond Walk and In the Tall, Tall Grass
• Shadow Science with The Dark, Dark Night and What Makes a Shadow?
• Science Skills: Counting & Measuring with Pizza at Sally's
• Magnet Science with Stuck

Do you offer these programs on a one time occasional basis, in scheduled sessions of multiple weeks in a row, or are they integrated into a schedule that also includes non-science storytimes?
     Preschool Science programs appeared on the program calendar for the branch library every other month, or six times per year. The regular branch storytime schedule involved three weeks of back-to-back storytimes each month, but Preschool Science (and any other “bonus” preschool programs, like dance parties, etc.) were scheduled in addition to regular storytimes. We did make an effort to schedule Preschool Science on a day of the week that we didn’t usually have a storytime; this decision was to allow as many families with a range of schedules and availability the option to attend one of our early literacy programs.

Do you bring in other elements of a traditional storytime into a Preschool Science program? (e.g., fingerplays, rhymes?)
     I certainly do integrate fingerplays and rhymes into Preschool Science programs. I prefer to match rhymes and other elements with our science topic--as another way to reinforce basic concept knowledge--but if I need to throw in a song for a fidgety group, I’ll do that, too. I haven’t always found songs, rhymes, or fingerplays that match all my science topics, but I’m always on the lookout.

Do you set a lower age limit, or do babies and toddlers come to play too?
     The programs are advertised for ages 3-5 with a caregiver. Siblings are welcome to attend as well, but the program content is not geared at younger children.

How long does a typical Preschool Science program run?
     The story and other concept introduction portion lasts 10-15 minutes, and then kids are able to spend the rest of the time at any or all of the hands-on stations (with their caregivers). As a result of this self-paced format, the program can last anywhere from 20-45 minutes. That is, after everyone finished the introduction portion together, some kids will spend 5 minutes at the stations while others will happily spend 30 minutes. It’s up to them and their level of engagement.

I imagine these events are wildly popular. Do you register and/or cap attendance, or is it come one come all?
     I have always put a registration limit on my Preschool Science programs because of the size of the program room. Technically speaking, I could easily do the storytime introduction portion for a huge group, and since the hands-on activities are self-paced, there’s no limit to potential audience their, either. So I’ve just always let the capacity of the room be my guide for capping attendance. That said, if a coworker were leading the program and felt more comfortable with a restricted group size, I’d totally accommodate that.

I see you set up stations for after the storytime. Some of them seem sequential, while others seem to be more go-to-what-interests-you in any order. How do you decide what set-up will work best for a given program? Does one way work better than another in terms of: How kids enjoy it? Getting the lesson across? What is easiest to do?
     Let me start off by saying that, when I’m planning the hands-on stations, I never envision that they need to be done in a certain order. I intentionally plan for the stations to be able to stand alone; this is because, with the self-paced nature of the hands-on exploration time, I would have no control over who goes to what station when, and I also wouldn’t want to create a bottleneck of everyone trying to do the same stations, in the same order, at the same time. So I make sure that stations can be done in any order at any pace and still be meaningful.
     Kids really seem to enjoy the fact that stations are self-paced, as it allows them to spend an amount of time on an activity that is appropriate to their attention span and interest. Also, because stations are self-paced, it is expected that the child’s caregiver will “do” the stations with the child. As a result, kids seem to love getting to “do” science with their grownup, whatever the particular activity is.
     I do make sure, in setting up each station, that I include on each table a caregiver “cheat sheet,” if you will, which gives brief, simple instructions for the activity at the particular station as well as a few key vocab words and/or questions they can ask their children as they do the activity together. That’s how I try to ensure that the science concept for the program gets across.
     And to reiterate an earlier point, I think it’s easiest to offer standalone stations to keep the flow of the room moving. If I had to spend my time in the program helping people take turns along a set course of stations, I wouldn’t have time to meander about the room and talk to kids and caregivers about what they were doing and observing.

Putting these programs together, do you tend to start with a book you like or the concept?
     When I first started offering Preschool Science programs, I would start with a basic science concept and then build a program around it (i.e., find a book or books, figure out some group discussion activities, and then plan the stations). After I’d gotten the program rolling for a few months, however, I started to keep a list of newer picture books that would lend themselves well to a science topic of a future Preschool Science program.

Do you have additional staffing requirements to run the stations?
     Because the stations are self-guided and standalone, and because caregivers are expected to attend with their kids and go through the stations with them, I don’t require any extra staffing for the stations in the program. I’d occasionally have a homeschooled teen volunteer come before a program to help with set up the stations, but didn’t require additional help in the program.

Do you have a set end time, or do people linger and trickle out gradually?
     I booked the program room for a 45 minute long program. As I mentioned above, some kids and their caregivers only stayed for 20 minutes--that was sufficient time for them to go through the activities in a way that was meaningful and interesting for them. Others (usually slightly older preschoolers) stayed in activities for much longer, and so the 45 minute cap gave them good parameters for when it was time to wrap up their explorations at the library. I did always encourage further exploration at home, so it never felt like I had to kick a kid out of the program when our time was up.

You have noted positive caregiver/child exchanges at the stations. Have you had similar interactions between librarian and caregiver?
     Yes! I always tried to talk to caregivers as I meandered between hands-on activity stations. This was especially possible with the caregivers of kids who stayed longest in the program. I would talk to caregivers about how they could replicate simple science activities at home; how they could ask open-ended questions to help their children learn; and I’d also answer questions about science resources at the library and elsewhere in the community. The interactions were great, and they left me feeling confident that science wasn’t just an at-the-library thing for many of the families--that they became dedicated to being scientists at home, too.

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Do you have any additional questions about how I've done Preschool Science programs? Ask away in the comments!

Stargazer Nights at the Library

This spring at my library, we're exploring both microcosms and macrocosms as part of the newest rotation of the BOOMbox, our flexible STEAM space. Under the heading Big and Small, the space is filled with microscopes, telescopes, and all manner of activities to explore these various cosmos.

My coworker Amy had the outstanding idea to move some of the formal programming for this spring outside of the physical library space by offering Stargazer Nights on the Village Green adjacent to the library. All the better to take advantage of the Cometron telescopes the library purchased, Amy reasoned. And to maximize the potential audience for these sessions, Amy asked me if I'd be willing to host one session per month on the night of my usual weekly evening shift while she offered sessions on hers. I was excited to help!

So far we've hosted four of our six total Stargazer Nights. While these events appear on our online and print calendars and BOOMbox flyers, they're drop-in events, with no registration required. Despite the fact that we've had 2/4 overcast evenings, we've had several dozen participants each time. And I consider this next bit exciting: through informal conversations with the folks who come to participate, we've found out that about 80% of participants had not come to the library specifically for the event; rather, they serendipitously discovered it was happening on their way into or out of the library. Visibility, here, was a huge factor--folks could see the telescopes pointing upward as they went about their library business, and natural curiosity and wonder induced them to stop and look up, too.

Regardless of the visibility on any given evening, each Stargazer Night introduced families and individuals across a wide age spectrum to basic telescope skills and etiquette. We talked about using the finderscope to help to point the telescope at the desired object to view; how the mirrors of the telescope cause what we see through the eyepiece to be inverted; and how to focus the telescope. Amy and I have also discovered an excellent way to help young stargazers use the telescope without bumping it and thus changing the view: we ask kids to put their hands in their pockets before leaning over to look in the eyepiece. Simple!

We talked about simple astronomical identification skills such as finding the Big Dipper; using the Big Dipper to locate the North Star; and how to tell a star from a planet from a man-made satellite. We also talked visible constellations, including Orion (we had a great view in March) and Leo (in April). We saw the moon in several different phases over the course of the four Stargazer Nights, and so we had conversations about the phases of the moon and their names as well.

The cream of the crop, though, truly was looking through our Cometron telescope to see the moon in sharper relief as well as a few planets. We've been able to see Venus (both with the naked eye and through telescopes), but Jupiter really takes the cake. Jupiter is plenty visible without a telescope, but we were also to see a whopping 5 of Jupiter's moons when we viewed the planet through the telescope. 5! So many participants' minds were blown at being able to see such distant celestial bodies.

While we have two more Stargazer Nights coming up in May, I must say we've already had some outstanding outcomes. On the most basic level, we've had lots of participants of all ages expressing thanks for being able to even do this sort of thing at the library. We're relatively near Chicago, with its Adler Planetarium, but even so everyone we talked to was thrilled to have this type of opportunity in Skokie. Parents commented that they particularly appreciated being able to expose their children to this type of technology. One family who stumbled upon the event and joined had never even seen a telescope before--what an amazing opportunity for the library to have a significant impact on their scientific knowledge.

The programs thus far have engaged a wide range of ages and knowledge levels. We had the aforementioned novices, but we also have had longtime astronomy hobbyists who enjoyed a) participating in something they care deeply about with others, and b) having the opportunity to share their knowledge by answering some questions when Amy and I were helping other folks.

The majority of participants fell into some middle ground--they knew a bit about stargazing and/or astronomy, but hadn't been reminded to look up in quite some time. Stargazer Nights resparked their interest. And that's what we ultimately want of any BOOMbox activity: to spur an interest or motivation to engage in a topic beyond the library program itself. To that end, we made sure that anyone who was interested in continuing to stargaze on their own was able to take home the monthly Evening Sky Map we had printed from SkyMaps.com.

If we can inspire behavior that leads to further exploration? I consider that a stellar program.