National Young Readers Week

Last week we celebrated National Young Readers Week in the elementary library.  We invited several guests to read to the students in grades K-5.  The students listened to the stories the guests brought, then they got the opportunity to ask the guest reader about his or her job.  Reading to the Kindergarten and first graders in an assembly in the commons were the principal, Mrs. Huene, two high school drama students Ellie and Sam, and our State Congressman Mike Unes.  Reading to second grade was Peoria Journal Star reporter and columnist, Steve Tarter.  Third Grade heard a story by WMBD television news reporter Kim Behrens and fourth and fifth grade students were visited by radio play-by-play voice of the Peoria Chiefs, Nathan Baliva.
The kids really seemed to enjoy the stories, but even more fun were the great questions they had for the visiting readers.  Both Nathan Baliva and Kim Behrens were asked if they make mistakes when reporting and if it is embarrassing when they do make a mistake.  Both admitted to making mistakes and being embarrassed, but the great part about their jobs is that it is live on-air. The lesson to the students is that you fix your mistakes and move on.  All visitors told the students about how important reading is in their jobs and all encouraged the students to read as much as they can for whatever they want to do in the future.
This is the second year that we have invited local "celebrities" into the school to read for National Young Readers Week, and this year seemed to be even more exciting than last.  Students remembered the event last year and were really excited to see who was going to read to them this year.  Another great feature about the week is the feedback from the guest readers.  They all shared how much fun it is to visit the students and refreshing it is to see the excitement in the students.  I think sometimes as adults we get so wrapped up in our "adult world" and working with other adults and making adult decisions that we forget about the impact we can make on young people.  And the real secret is the impact they have on us.  They remind us of and give us their energy and enthusiasm for life; they reignite that curiosity we had when we were younger.  It is quite refreshing which is why I love my job as a school librarian.
So, while seemingly National Young Readers Week is about sharing and encouraging reading with our young people, it has benefits for everyone!

Internet Security

Last year at our school, the IT director and I started a series of Internet safety lessons that we teach to each different grade in the school from 6th to 12th grades. We cover topics from evaluating websites for research to Social Networking.  What is always interesting is that the students almost always know more about certain aspects and features of using the Internet than we do, but rarely do they know or even think about anything regarding securing their own personal information and identity.
This week we did a lesson with sixth grade on using Facebook and other social networking websites.  The students were familiar with the workings of Facebook and helped me browse around my own site, but by a show of hands, less than half of them who have an account (which is about 65% of them), had ever visited, to their knowledge, the security section of Facebook to set up the security parameters.  This verified for us that the topic of our lesson was needed, but this is concerning.  My hope is that when students of any age 6-12 grades open a social networking account, that not only parents and adult family visit frequently, but that they also help with talking about and setting security parameters.  However, I visited many of the students' Facebook sites as a "non-friend" to discover that many of them are wide open to view and post. Scary.
We close our presentation telling the students that social networking sites are not bad, but sometimes bad people ruin good things.  They should use Facebook, Skype, Twitter and other social networking sites when their parents allow, but they must be smart about how they use them.  We highly recommend they talk with their parents about the security of their sites and encourage them to visit the security section of whatever site they use. "Go there today!" we say.  Just like everything else in education and working with kids, we know that several will not do anything.  Maybe because they think nothing bad will happen to them, maybe because they just forget in their busy day and minds, or maybe because they are not sure they really understand.  Hopefully, the lesson will get them to think about these issues and someday they will take action to protect themselves.