July 10th

Pajama Storytime!

I observed my first storytime today. It was a Pajama Storytime. Pamela started Pajama Storytime for families who couldn't make the storytimes earlier in the day. It is offered once a month at 6:45pm on Wednesday. It tends to be more intimate and casual. She said the turn-out was relatively low - she expected 50 kids and about 30-40 showed up!

Theme-Frogs

1. Introduction: "Hi Everybody! Are you ready? Let's sing a song!"
2. Activity #1: Song & Sign Language "The more we get together the happier we'll be"
3. Story #1: "Too Many Frogs" Encouragement to the crowd - "If you can't see you can come closer." She emphasized the repetitive part of the story - "Toodaloo!"
4. Story#2: "An Extraordinary Egg" The crowd was well mannered so she chose another story. She introduced it by saying it was one of her very favorite books. She asked if they knew what the word "extraordinary" meant - it means very special.
5. Activity#2: Flannel Board & Song "5 Green and Speckled Frogs"
6. Story #3: "Frog in the Bog" This was a shorter story and it rhymed and counted.
7. Story #4: "Wide Mouthed Frog" This was a short story with pop-ups. One child said, "I want to see it again!" and she read it a second time, faster.
8. Craft: Frog Puppet - Cut outs of body, 2 frog hands, 2 frog feet, 2 pieces of green yarn, 1 popsicle stick, markers, glue stick. All the kids and parents really enjoyed the craft. There was lots of smiling and singing of "5 Green and Speckled Frogs" while they were creating their frog puppets.

Bibliography of books:

• Too Many Frogs; Sandy Asher
• An Extraordinary Egg; Leo Lionni
• A Frog in the Bog; Karma Wilson
• The Wide Mouthed Frog; Keith Faulkner

Extra books on hand for checkout:

• One Frog Sang; Shirley Parenteau
• Hey Frog; Piet Grobler
• Froggy books by Jonathan London
• Stick; Steve Breen
• Little Quacks New Friend; Lauren Thompson
• Excuse Me; Lisa Kopelke
• Fish is Fish; Leo Lionni
• Hoptoad; Jane Yolen

Subject Headings
I explored catalog subject headings in the picture book reference book "A to Zoo". Using the example of the theme Up & Down I found:
Activities - balooning
Activities - flying
Activities - jumping
Animals - frogs
Animals - rabbits
Concepts - opposites
Concepts - up & down
Emotions - happiness
Emotions - sadness
Oceans see Sea & Seashore
Space & space ships

The challenge with the titles listed for each subject heading is that it only lists author and title - there is no publication date.

General Key Word search is a powerful tool because it will search the title, summary, and subject fields. It's a better net for an amorphous subject like "up & down".

Question Point
There was a particularly detailed and difficult reference question at the desk. After exhausting his options, the librarian decided the question was beyond his expertise. So he composed the question, showed it to the patron to review and verify that was what he was asking, and submitted the question to Question Point. The strategy was that when a question is beyond your expertise you can submit it to a larger brain pool. "You do the best you can and your colleagues take it further".
One caveat - when you show the composed question for the patron to review, make sure they don't nod and say yes, that's what they meant just because they are too timid or polite to correct you. Once it is sent to Question Point, the more chances there are for misinterpretations and not getting the person the information they're looking for.

Here was the translation of the patrons question by Mike:
Patron is interested in buying a piece of property in Lewis County. The parcel has a small stream running through part of it. Before making an offer, he needs to determine what regulations, county, state or federal, will have an impact on any improvements or development he may make. He is specifically interested in any stream or wetlands regulations that may apply. He has been to the Lewis County website, but was unable to find such regulations. How should he proceed? Are there specific agencies where he might make inquiries? Are there on-line information resources that he can consult?

The only thing the patron added was the parcel # of the property.

First Search
First Search is a password protected OCLC database that the librarians use to make Inter Library Loan requests. After you search the catalog and find that the library does not have the title the patron needs, you can go to First Search to request it. For example, a patron requested a Math Teaching textbook for grades K-8. SPL generally doesn't carry textbooks so we requested through First Search. Patrons can also request ILL books but they fill out a form - they don't search OCLC. This tool is also great for music CDs.

Reference Interview
Another stumper today: A patron came in asking for a book of classic Buddhist poetry he had read about. The librarian asked where he had heard about it. He read about it in the Seattle Times religion section but he couldn't remember when.
Strategies: Searched Seattle Times archives and ProQuest. Finally we found one religion column but not the right one. But it was the right columnist. So we searched for everything written by that columnist. The book "The Dhammapada" was found in the March issue of the Seattle Times!

Donations
A patron wanted to know how to donate books and if she could donate to a specific library branch. We found her a pamphlet on Book Donations and a pamphlet for donating to the Library Foundation.