Painting with Grandparents - Grandma Moses and Grandparents Day! September 7 & 9

1 Hour

Intended for 25 guests, grades K-5 with grandparent(s)

Supplies

"The Dot" by Peter H. Reynolds
25 water color sets
25 paint brushes
75 pieces of watercolor paper or card stock
Lovely classical music
Printings (from a color printer) or Grandma Moses's art

Program

As a Children's Librarian, we often become aware of obscure holidays and then find ways to celebrate them in programs.

September 9th is Grandparents Day. 

September 7th is Grandma Moses Day.  It was designated so because September 7th is the birthday of Anna Mary Robertson Moses.  She started a successful American folk painting career late in her life (when she was already a Grandma) which is why she was affectionately named Grandma Moses.  She commonly painted scenes from America's rural past.  Her paintings were used to publicize numerous American holidays.  During the 1950s, her exhibitions were so popular they broke attendance records!

Why not combine these two holidays, since they are so close in date and have a Painting with Grandparents program to celebrate them!

Grandma Moses, Halloween, 1955

I printed out some of Grandma Moses's art work and hung it in the program room to create a galleria.  Very simple yet totally refined. ;)

On one half of the room, there was a story corner set up, and on the other half, tables and chairs with water colors and paints.  

At the beginning of the program, I read a brief description of who Grandma Moses was and why it is celebrated on September 7th and also explained that Grandparents day is only 2 days after.

I then read a book to inspire the creativity of the group and warm their hearts.  Peter H. Reynold's "The Dot" is just a lovely story that teaches everyone they can be an artist.

After a reading of the story, I put on the classical music (a lovely mix of Bach, Beethoven, and Brahms) and told everyone to go out to the tables and paint and be free!  The results were amazing.  Beautiful works of art from the children and the grandparents alike.  All in all, it was just a lovely, and very simple program to do.

These are two paintings that were made for me by two little guys who love the Titanic!  Truly made my day! 

International Sing Out Day! September 15

1 hour

Intended for 25 guests, grades 5-7

Supplies

Karaoke Machine OR

Gaming system that has karaoke games

Karaoke CDs OR

Karaoke games

Pizza (optional: for those hungry tweens!)

Plates

Napkins

Drinks

Program

This is pretty simple, and you probably get whats going on just by reading the supplies list.  Karaoke for tweens!  Some people just love to sing.  (I did and still do!)  Karaoke is a good time whether you can or can't sing, just watch others who do or just want to hang out with a fun crowd!  Why not host a karaoke event in a safe environment.  Monitor to make sure they are taking turns or have a sign up sheet and they can put in their song requests.  Just have fun with this one and they have fun too! 

The following gaming systems have karaoke games and microphone pieces to go with them:  PlayStation2, PlayStation3, Wii, XBOX360

At our library we have:

For the PlayStation2 and 3: 

Karaoke Revolution 

Karaoke Revolution Country

American Idol Encore

For the Wii:

Disney Sing It

Disney Sing It: Party Hits

Disney Sing It: High School Musical

Disney Sing It: High School Musical 3 - Senior Year

Disney Sing It: Pop Hits

Boogie

Hannah Montana: Spotlight World Tour

For XBOX360:
Karaoke Revolution: American Idol Encore

Dictionary Day! October 16

Drop-in Program, All day

Intended for all the guests of the Children's Department

Supplies

Paper
Pencils

Program

Dictionary Day is October 16!  I wanted a fun and creative way to celebrate the language that we use, for better or for worse.  This is a very simple drop-in program that can take place all day long.  Participants can ask the reference librarian for a pencil and a piece of paper, and then feel free to create their own word, including a new definition too.  The created words can then be displayed on a bulletin board through out the day or till the end of the week.  Participants will feel pride in having their own new and innovative word on display for all to see! 

If you want to get a little fancy, because it is too simple for you, you could create a template for the participants to use when creating their new word:

confergate (kuhn-fur-geyt) verb. to go through a passageway by use of a secret or magic word of phrase. 

That's pretty much all she wrote.  Pun intended. 

Life Size Treasure Hunt!

45 minutes

Intended for 24 guests, grades 2-6

Supplies

An assortment of 35 or so random objects (ie. floppy disk, plastic banana, nerf darts, toy car, marbles, dice, clothes pins, toy figures, hilighter, peppermint candies, legos, a golden egg...)
A digital camera
Blocks (to create a background setting for the photo)
Smartboard
Laptop
Interactive "hidden objects" game

Program

For this program, the idea was to not only participate in a life size treasure hunt, but also to create your own to take with you!

In my library, we have a smart board.  And these things are actually pretty cool and very interactive.  We have been encouraged to use the smart boards in programs, so I was trying to think of a way that I could use it in a program and also have the kids use it.  I instantly thought of those "hidden objects" games!  I may or may not have an addiction to the hidden object games...
I used my MacBook for the program (because that's what I am familiar with) and from the Apple App store and I purchased Mysteryville: Hidden Object Investigation to use for the program.  It is like an "I Spy" book, but it's interactive.  There is a story line that goes with the objects you have to find, there is a certain amount of time to find the hidden objects, once you find the object you have to click on it and if you click too many random things you get a time penalty.  It's a lot of fun.  I wanted to project this game onto the smart board, and have the kids be able to play it on a huge screen and touch the items to collect them.  It was simple enough to implement, yet fancy and techie enough to draw a crowd and keep them interested. 

The second part of the program  was creating your own hidden objects game. I brought in 35 different totally random objects from home and I borrowed some from the library play space too.  Our library also has big foam building blocks.  I had the children build a setting with the foam blocks to use as a background for the "I Spy" picture.  I placed all the random items on a table in the room.  I had the children stand pick a random item that they wanted place in the scene.  Once the scene was set, I then used the digital camera to take a picture of the scene.  I wrote up a list of all the items that were hidden in the picture so that later on they can play and share with others the game they created. 

Here are the photos from two different angles!  See how many hidden objects you can find!  

  

International Paper Airplane Day! August 17

45 minutes

Intended for 25 guests, grades 2-4

Supplies

Pilot Wings pins
Paper (about 150 sheets)
Pencils
Hula hoops
Painters tape
String
"Origami Paper Airplanes" by Dider Boursin
"Paper Airplanes: Flight School" by Christopher L. Harbo
"Paper Airplanes: Copilot" by Christopher L. Harbo
"Paper Airplanes: Pilot" by Christopher L. Harbo
"Paper Airplanes: Captain" by Christopher L. Harbo
"The Kid's Guide to Paper Airplanes" by Christopher L. Harbo

Program

This program is about making paper airplanes, obviously, but it is also about that age old lesson: "If at first you don't succeed, try, try again!"  It is a learning experience, as is much of life. 

When I was planning this program in my mind, where everything goes wonderfully according to how I envision it, I thought I would be able to have one of the major airlines graciously donate (because it's for the children!) the pilot wing pins that they hand out to children who fly with their airline.  This was a very lovely thought indeed.  However, when I started to do the footwork, and I called or emailed several of the major airlines (I will not drop names), I was given what is commonly known as "the runaround" and I received no complementary pins from anyone.  Sad face.  Thankfully though, Oriental Trading had these little pins ($3 for one dozen):

And my vision was fulfilled!

As the children walk into the program, you can hand them their unofficially official pilot wing pins as you tell them that today, they will become champions of the art form known as paper airplanes. 

I set up half of the room with tables for constructing planes.  On the tables, I laid out the various books listed above so that they can get some ideas.  I also had pencils on the table so they could write their names on the plane and create a plane name.  The other half of the room was set up with tests and obstacles to which they could submit their newly fashioned paper airplanes.

I put painters tape on the floor for a starting line, and had the children stand on the line and give their airplane a toss to see whose went farther. 

I hung hula hoops from the ceiling and they tried to fly their planes through the rings. 

I had baskets on the floor, and they tried to get their plane to land in the bucket.  Because, if you've flown on a plane before, you know that the landing is just as important as the flight. 

If their first plan does not preform in the test arena as they wished, they can "try, try again" and make a new one!

Department Wide Mystery!

1 Week

Intended for all the guests of the Children's Department 

Supplies

Paper

Assorted clues to leave behind at the scene of the crime

Program

One of the books that I use to get ideas from, The Storytime Sourcebook II, has a section titles "Topical Events Calendar for Tie-in Storytime Themes."  Looking through this, I learned that the first week in October is Mystery Series Week.  So I decided to create a mystery for the whole department to solve during this week.  

On the first day, I released the back story: 

WHO STOLE THE COOKIES FROM THE COOKIE JAR:

A CLASSIC WHODUNIT

THE FACTS:

Mrs. Fusco is a wonderful baker.  Often, she bakes cookies for the librarians, the clerks and the pages in the Children’s Department.  The Children’s Department decided to have a little party to celebrate the library and all the good work we do!  Mrs. Fusco brought her tasty peanut-butter cookies in a fancy cookie jar and put them on the top shelf.  But when everyone went to enjoy the cookies, the jar was empty!!!

And the suspects:

(I took clip art images of different people from Google and created a profile for each one.)

 

Each day following, I released a one new clue and a new development: 

(I had the physical clues in the library for our mystery solvers to check out!)

CLUE 1: 

There was a pair of sunglasses left at the scene of the crime…

         

  

NEW DEVELOPMENTS:

The sunglasses were women’s sunglasses.

CLUE 2:  

There was handwritten note left at the scene of the crime…

NEW DEVELOPMENTS:

A handwriting analysis proved that it was written by someone left handed. 

CLUE 3:  

There was what looks like tire marks left around the scene of the crime…

         

NEW DEVELOPMENTS:

The tire marks were tested at the lab and was determined they were created by a toy truck. 

CLUE 4:  There was some fur found at the scene of the crime…

NEW DEVELOPMENTS:

The fur was from a cat. 

CLUE 5: 

All of the fake flowers at the celebration were replaced with real ones…

         

NEW DEVELOPMENTS:

One of the librarians brought fresh flowers to the party.   

CLUE 6: 

There was a strong smell of aftershave at the scene of the crime…

All throughout the week, and especially at the end of the week, the guests were encouraged to make their guess as to which suspect stole the cookies from the cookie jar!  Can you guess who it was?  

Digital Detectives

1 hour

Intended for 20 guests, grades 4-7

Digital detectives is a scavenger hunt that takes place in the library and incorporates technology.  Sounds awesome, right?  Well, it is.  Guests are given clues, and from there, they need to find the location of their next clue.  Some times, guests are asked to take a picture at a location, or use a QR reader to read a QR code to find their next clue.  Be creative with this!  

Supplies

Paper to write clues on

Prizes for the winning team (if you so choose)

Program

The set up and prep for this program is the most intense part.  After that, it kind of just flows on it's own.  Put on your thinking cap, and get ready to think up some clues for your detectives.  You can see below, that I tried to go more general, and featured a lot of different sections in the library.  This way, while they are scavenging, they are also giving themselves a grand tour.  

I created one set of 14 clues.  I printed out four sets of these 14 clues, each set having its own brightly colored paper.  Each color will be a different team.  (I had 4 teams with 5 members each.)  I numbered each set of clues with a different order.  I went around the library and hid the clues in their respective hiding places.  The brightly colored paper make it some what easy to find once hidden.  

At the start of the program, explain that each team is a different color, and that you are only to take your color clue.  If you take the wrong color, you will miss out on clues and lose.  If needed, also explain how to use the QR reader (I use NeoReader -- very easy and fast!) and take photos with the device.  We use iPads for this program. You can give them one chance to "Ask A Librarian" for help finding a clue, or more if you would like, but the point is to get them to use their detective skills!  Hand each team an iPad and the first clue in their uniquely ordered set. (This way there is not a huge mob all running to one location.)  Once they have their first clue, it is on them to find the next, and so on after.    

The first team to bring back all 14 clues, and take the needed photos wins!  

Below are the clues that I created and used for my Digital Detectives hunt:

If you’re really hungry, you might find some food to make in this book.   [HINT: Remember to include the word “juvenile” in your search]

When you first started reading, you probably checked out some EASY READERS.  Head on over there and find your clue!

Find the GRAPHIC NOVEL section and snap a photo of your favorite hero.  Find your next clue in this area!

If you want to look something up in the library catalogue, this computer might help you.  [HINT: CHECK BEHIND THE SCREEN]

If you don’t want to read a book, you can always listen to a book using one of these…

Tired of the same old books?  Why don’t you try a NEW BOOK!

Something to get the beat bumping?  NOW THAT’S WHAT I CALL MUSIC!

Coming after the DVD, these “blue” discs boast HD movie viewing capabilities.

Snap a photo of your team playing with some fun toys.  [HINT: CHECK THE PLAYSPACE]  Find your next clue in this area!

Find a book about the state we are in right now!

Check out the video gaming section and snap a photo of a teammate pretending to play.  Find your next clue in this area!

The first QR code shows a picture of the Harry Potter series. 

The second shows a penguin.

The last shows a picture of Mickey Mouse.  

Happy hiding and hunting!