Progress

I have slowly been making progress towards finishing all my school work for this semester. There are only 3 more weeks of classes after this week!

Information Needs of Children:

Big Stuff
Revise fiction book review and submit

Multicultural Paper - In progress. I've selected the book I'm going to evaluate and started research

Final Bibliography project - In progress. I've read (and rejected) several books already and taken notes on the ones that are possibilities. Still have a TON to read though.

Normal Stuff
Realistic fiction reading notes - read and write reading notes on 4 realistic fiction children's books, two of which must be "sensitive topic"

Historical fiction reading notes - read The Birchbark House and write reading notes

Multicultural reading notes - started reading Becoming Naomi Leon

Non-fiction reading notes - read 1 biography, 1 sex education book, 1 science book and 1 art or music book and write reading notes

Textbook and other readings - In progress as always

Assessing Information Needs:

Big Stuff
Finish my personal information behavior paper (which is barely started) - compare and contrast my personal information behavior using two different models, theories or paradigms.

Discussion Leading Presentation - create PowerPoint presentation for my turn at discussion leading and then actually present it

Literature Review about the information behavior of a population of my choice - I've started reading and taking notes on articles, but so far haven't read any that I think I can actually use.

Normal Stuff
Weekly text book readings - In progress as usual

Weekly article readings - In progress as usual

Weekly discussion board posts - In progress as usual

Intro. to Information Policy (that I took last semester):

I'm just going to wait to do this until after the semester is over - fit it in before the summer semester starts up.

Book Reviews

One of the skills we are learning this semester in my Information Needs of Children class is how to write book reviews of the sort that appear in professional review media (such as School Library Journal or Booklist). They are very short (we are being held to 300 words - no more and hopefully not too much less either). This makes it a challenge because you need to convey as much information about the book as you can in those 300 words; a librarian can only personally read so many books, so a lot of decisions about whether to purchase a book or not are based on these type of reviews.

As I said, it's really hard to write one that is only 300 words and contains all the necessary information, but it is also kind of fun. Below are the two I wrote for class.

Yolen, Jane. How Do Dinosaurs Say Good Night? Illus. by Mark Teague. New York. Scholastic, Inc. 2000. unpaged. $16.99. PreS-Gr 3. ISBN 978-0-590-31681-1.

This bed time story will make adults and children roar with laughter as it speculates on the nature of dinosaur bed time rituals. Every two-page spread creates a scene that represents one possible way a dinosaur might say good night. "Does he mope, does he moan, does he sulk, does he sigh?" The questions in the text encourage children to participate by guessing what comes next. The illustrations for each scene depict a normal human parent attempting to get his or her dinosaur child into bed. The rhyming text about dinosaur bed time tantrums works well with the unexpected visuals of large dinosaurs in human children's bedrooms to create an overall humorous effect. In one scene, a giant trachodon stomps his feet on his bedroom floor as his father looks on. "Does a dinosaur stomp his feet on the floor / and shout: 'I want to hear one book more!'?" As he stomps his feet, books fly through the air, and his bed is partially lifted off the floor leaving his little dog clinging to the bed post. The bright, expressive, cartoon-like paintings echo the whimsy in the text, and the little details in the illustrations, such as the paintings on the walls and the toys on the floor, really bring the story to life. The illustrations are even a little bit educational; the dinosaur species name can be found in each scene. The text flows easily when spoken aloud and the illustrations are large enough to be seen from a distance making for good story time or one-on-one reading. In the end, the truth about how dinosaurs say good night is revealed, and it just might help get a reluctant child to go to bed without making a fuss (or they might demand you read it again).

Pullman, Philip. I Was a Rat! Illus. by Kevin Hawkes. New York. Random House, Inc. 1999. 165p. $5.99. Gr 4-6. ISBN 0-440-41661-2.

Bob doesn't know what to think when a little boy in a tattered page's uniform appears on his doorstep one night. When Bob asks the boy his name, all he can say is, "I lost it. I forgot it. I was a rat." This is the story of the scruffy page boy, named Roger by Bob's wife, Joan. Roger is unsure of how to live as a boy (and is quite fond of nibbling pencils). The question is: was Roger really a rat? Roger's adventures take him to the palace for study by the Philosopher Royal; to a carnival where he lives briefly as Professor Tapscrew's Rat-Boy, "the Wonder of the Age;" to the sewers and eventually the dungeon as the "Monster of the Sewers." ("It looks uncannily like a small boy." "Appearances are deceptive!") Sensational newspaper covers from The Daily Scourge, a tabloid newspaper, appear occasionally between chapters; the editor "encouraged his reporters to listen up for every kind of weird or sentimental or horrible or sensational story they could find." The articles appear unrelated at first, but they provide clues about the story's origin and enhance the fun of puzzling out the truth of Roger's past. Everything from psychology to the press to society's obsession with the sensational are made fun of. Satire, adventure, a little mystery, and a likeable protagonist are skillfully combined in this funny, fairy tale adventure that will appeal to both boys and girls. The dialogue and colorful characters like the Philosopher Royal and Oliver Tapscrew make this work well as a classroom read aloud. Its fairy tale roots also make it an appropriate example of fairy tale retellings. Roger's story is based on a fairy tale, but does he get a fairy tale ending? Well, he does get toasted cheese.

You can't bring a balloon....

When we were "reading" wordless books in my Info. Needs of Children class, I put a whole bunch on hold at the library. I used the first one that came in for my class assignment, but as other's came in, I "read" them as well.

The last one to come in, weeks after the assignment on wordless books, was You Can't Take a Balloon into the National Gallery by Jacqueline Preiss Weitzman (Author) and Robin Glasser (Illustrator). For those local to D.C., it's a *great* book! The story follows a little girl with a red balloon as she goes to the National Gallery of Art with her grandmother. She can't take the balloon inside though, so she ties it up outside. The balloon of course, floats away so the person she left guarding it chases it all through D.C. - up the Washington Monument, through the Cherry Blossom Festival and the Marine Corps Marathon, even through a session of Congress. The illustrations are filled with real people - presidents, supreme court justices, assorted historical figures - there's a guide at the back listing who everyone is on each page. It's almost like a Where's Waldo except for real people. The pages alternate between following the balloon and following the little girl and her grandmother through the museum where they look at real works of art that are actually in the National Gallery.

Unfortunately, it's out-of-print. There are two more in the series though, and both of them are still in-print: You Can't Take a Balloon Into the Metropolitan Museum and You Can't Take a Balloon into the Museum of Fine Arts. I haven't read either of them, but I imagine they are along the same lines except in New York and Boston instead.

More registration frustrations

This morning registration for both the summer and fall semesters opened up at 8 am. Despite trying to get in continuously since 8 am, I was not able to access registration until almost 10 am. This is not acceptable. Especially since that meant my absolute top choice class was full by that point. It's a fall class, so I will just keep my fingers crossed that more spots open up in it before the semester starts. At the moment though, I'm really annoyed. I have been wanting to take this particular class since before I started school at all last fall.

Edited:

Well, I e-mailed the graduate coordinator earlier today to see if any more seats would open up for the class I wanted, and she was able to register me for it!

Spring Break

This week was spring break, and yet it was not relaxing at all. The work I have left for the rest of the semester is a little bit overwhelming at the moment. I intended to get a lot more done this week (like my book review and at least a first draft of my personal information behavior paper as they are due next week). At least I did get a draft done of my book review and my poetry reading notes done, plus the readings for my info. needs class.

Information Needs of Children:

Big Stuff
Revise fiction book review and submit

Multicultural Paper

Final Bibliography project - annotated bibliography with 5-page introduction discussing purpose, audience, resources used and selection criteria. The bibliography will include a list of 10 "best" books in my category and 10 "next best" or really, really good more recent books in my category. I am doing modern folktales (novel, graphic novel and short story collections) for upper elementary (grades 4-6). This means I need to read (or re-read) more than 20 books to make my selection from.

Normal Stuff
Realistic fiction reading notes - read and write reading notes on 4 realistic fiction children's books, two of which must be "sensitive topic"

Historical fiction reading notes - read The Birchbark House and write reading notes

Multicultural reading notes - read Becoming Naomi Leon and write reading notes

Non-fiction reading notes - read 1 biography, 1 sex education book, 1 science book and 1 art or music book and write reading notes

Textbook and other readings

Assessing Information Needs:

Big Stuff
Finish my personal information behavior paper (which is barely started) - compare and contrast my personal information behavior using two different models, theories or paradigms.

Discussion Leading Presentation - create PowerPoint presentation for my turn at discussion leading and then actually present it

Literature Review about the information behavior of a population of my choice - must be a review of at least 20 different sources. I'm hoping to do this on teenagers, but I have not yet found 20 different articles yet.

Normal Stuff
Weekly text book readings

Weekly article readings

Weekly discussion board posts

Intro. to Information Policy (that I took last semester):

Write an essay about libraries and information policy just to upload to my school media specialist e-portfolio for evaluation because when I took the class, the professor didn't mention anything about school media specialists having to do a specific assignment or about uploading to this e-portfolio thing. This has to be done some time before the end of the semester.