With summer reading in full swing and over 180 children signed up for “Go Green @ your library, ” this timely article from the Christian Science Monitor investigates the slow reading movement. Let us know what you think. We try to keep our children’s and our teen summer reading programs from being too fraught with the constant need to compete and rush through good books, so this year we developed the trading card game as the “prize generator.” Children are given a trading card for each visit and some will be random wild cards — so it’s luck of the draw really.
Read about the “Slow Reading” movement
July 9, 2010 at 2:02 pm (Community, Reviews, summer reading, youth)
Tags: reading skills, summer reading
Book Expo America
May 28, 2010 at 3:59 pm (Books, Community, Reviews, Uncategorized)
Pat and Mindy attended BEA in New York City May 25-27. Throngs of publishers, authors, librarians, and celebrities braved the 90 degree heat to view the latest in books and technologies coming soon to a library near you.
Wireless lounge at the Javitz Center in NYC
CNN interview station for authors and celebrities
Inside the exhibit hall
Great new selection of graphic novels for kids
May 7, 2010 at 8:29 pm (Books, Community, Reviews)
We are adding to our graphic novel collection for kids hoping to entice young readers to perk up their summer reading. According to an expert panel of presenters from Booklist Online, the graphic or cartoon novel is perfect for early readers because the illustrations are non-verbal support for the story line. For several years, Helen O. has grown our Young Adult/Teen collection of this interesting format but because of some more mature content, Mindy has been less than enthusiastic. We think this crop of new ‘toon’ books are suitable for young readers and we are actually getting the hang of reading the frames and enjoying the stories. Come check them out.
Book Sale Huge Success
April 24, 2010 at 11:58 am (Book Sale, Books, Community, Uncategorized)
The annual Friends of the Milne book sale was mobbed yesterday morning with happy buyers. And don’t overlook Josies Cafe and the silent auction of rare books in the WES cafeteria. The silent auction will end today (Saturday 4/24) at 2 p.m. so be sure to get your bids in. The volunteers are very skilled at holding back some of the books at the gym’s big sale refreshing the tables so bargains can still be found right up to the end of the sale (4 p.m. today). In the past, unsold books have gone to prison libraries or sold by the pound to smaller bookshops. A big sale and great time. We replenished our home library with two coffee table books and a box of paperbacks for less than $20 and are already settling in to read. See you there.
Back Up and Raring to Go
April 7, 2010 at 1:29 pm (Community, System Information, web site)
Our apologies to anyone who was inconvenienced by our recent CWMARS and web-hosting problems. Here’s what happened as far as we understand it. Our connection to the big servers in Paxton, MA that allow us to use Millenium Circulation would not receive packets sent from the Milne. Turned out to be faulty wiring somewhere in the Worcester area and as far as we know things are patched now. If you notice any odd things on your record during the April 1 to April 7 time period, remember that although we could check out materials using a simple number system (DOS), we couldn’t check anything in. This created quite a backlog for staff once the system came back up. Everything should be corrected by now but if you notice anything odd about your record, please let us know.
As for the library’s homepage, we have an on-going issue with the file path that we can’t correct here. Things are back to normal in our files with pictures up and functionality returned but we can no longer be seen at http://www.milnelibrary.org. All you need to do is change the path and drop the “www” or just Google “milnelibrary” and we will show up. We are still on the world wide web but our server isn’t pulling us from there. Don’t ask me, contact the guy behind the green curtain that makes it all work.
Trouble with the library’s website
April 2, 2010 at 11:42 am (Uncategorized)
We’re experiencing some problems with the new WordPress website at the Milne Library. In a server update, some of our files went AWOL so you will notice that the links are now working but anything like categories, posts, or pages are not available yet. Our guys are talking to their guys and we hope to have everything back in working order by the weekend. In the meantime, important stuff like the calendar, the catalog, and your account are still available. Apologies to the Friends whose photo show has been replaced by some guys with blueprints who look like they are about to redesign the library. This is actually a stock photo that came with our original WordPress theme. Those guys will go away once we can post to the pages again.
Join us at the WES Camp Fair for a preview of summer reading 2010
March 26, 2010 at 3:15 pm (Books, Summer Reading 2009, youth)
Tags: fun, prizes, summer reading, teens, youth
We will be taking part in the March 27 Camp Fair and Pancake Breakfast this Saturday to promote our summer reading program and collect all the other information on summertime activities for children. This summer we will GO GREEN @the library with games and activities that increase our awareness of the small changes we can make daily to reduce our environmental footprint. On the roster of fun: game cards to collect and trade, recycle bags (Martha Stewart “no-sew” grocery totes and T-bags), Jeff Boyer’s Attainable, Sustainable Energy Show, Jerry Schneider’s Butterfly Guy, clothing swaps, lots of art activities and tons of reading suggestions. And for TEENS, we want you to “THNK GRN” with a special costume design class, weekly prizes, a nature photography class, creative collage and the ever-popular MGRHS required reading list. Counting the days until June 28 when summer fun begins.
Big trouble in store for the regional library system
March 5, 2010 at 7:46 pm (Community, System Information)
Tags: budget information, CWMARS, library funding, WMRLS
Serious cuts to the regional library system will leave Western Mass. without the resources to continue excellent service.
At one of several legislative breakfasts being held across the Commonwealth, about 75 librarians, trustees, friends, and administrators listened to Representative “Smitty” Pignatelli, Senator Benjamin Downing, Assistant Regional Administrator Jan Resnick deliver some very bad news about the state budget and its impact on libraries.
Plans are afoot to consolidate all of the state’s six regions into a single entity thereby eliminating the Whately Western Regional headquarters and the CWMARS offices in Worcester that serve this end of the state. Staff would be greatly reduced with one central hub sending out two emissaries to the former regional sites. At first glance this may not seem like much of a sacrifice in a bad economy but behind the numbers are services like interlibrary loan, internet connectivity, continuing education for staff, summer reading programs, reference databases, and human capital. Consider this, the WMRLS system is nearly 50 years old and serves 316 libraries, including our state university, in four far-flung western counties. Last year alone the system delivered 1.8 million books. It takes some money and dedicated staff to handle that volume.
Our legislators must work within the confines of a system that leaves Pignatelli representing 40,000 people in a huge district pitted against his Boston counterpart representing the same number of folks in a four-square mile community. And at the State House, it leaves our five Western reps trying to be heard above the seventeen representatives in the Boston metro area alone. So we need you to voice your concerns about the looming cuts. Please consider sending an e-mail or letter to your representative. Follow up with a letter to the House Ways and Means and finish with a flourish —send a letter of support for libraries to Gov. Patrick. For more information on this issue stop by the library or visit the links on our main page.
Milne changes out NetLibrary for BYKI language learning system
March 2, 2010 at 5:15 pm (Community, languages)
Since we already have access to many e-audiobooks through the regional Overdrive software, we decided to discontinue our NetLibrary account with Recorded Books. But, in exchange we are going to offer you Recorded Books answer to a very popular language study program. A new link to BYKI is featured on our homepage. After creating an account, patrons can practice a variety of language programs, with audio feed back, flashcards, and several levels of intensity. We hope you like this change. Language audios will still be available at the library on compact disc format but this on-line application will be portable and available to you at all times. Enjoy, and let us know what you think.
Early Literacy Station at the Milne
February 23, 2010 at 4:31 pm (Uncategorized)
Thanks to a grant from the Sarnoff Raymond Foundation and the Friends, the children’s room announces the arrival of a new, very child-friendly, workstation with 45 pre-configured educational games designed to foster learning through fun. It doesn’t hurt that the software, ranging from phonics to math and geography is so intuitive that it supports a child’s first experiences with technology. Many of our families have experienced the frustration of working with our older CD-ROM collection from scratchy discs to wildly different navigation rules and setup requirements. The ELS workstation eliminates all that fuss. It even has a color printer for original artwork! Come check it out.
