Tomorrow, the new Taylor Swift album, The Tortured Poets Department drops*.
I’m not a Swiftie…but my students are. So, tomorrow our library lunch recess will be all Taylor!
Reading TS biographies.
Making bracelets.
Listening to her new album.
And coloring!
The web has a host of coloring pages, but these two were free and elementary-appropriate (trust me on this: some coloring pages look cute, but they include very non-elementary-appropriate doodles!)
Hot tip for K-5 librarians: take some time and make a Valentine for your students!
Why?
It shows students you care about them. Seriously. They will LOVE getting a valentine from you, their librarian.
Many kids go home, dump their Valentine cards, and show their loot to their grown-ups. Now imagine the grown-ups seeing a card from you, the librarian. They see that you took time to make a card for their child. This is easy, positive marketing of your library!
It really is EASY – the image above is a template I made in Canva! And 8 cards print per page!
The book heart photos are from Canva, save one – the blue background is my original valentine from Sockeye Library back in 2020. Want to use your own photo to make a custom card? Upload it to Canva, then drag/drop it over the top of one of the pictures, and it’ll immediately resize and replace the other image!
These are designed to print double-sided but could be done single-sided. The template includes two pages – the color image and the back, which needs to be updated with your name 🙂
I do print these in color. With 8 valentines that print per page, it averages to 3-4 sheets of paper per class. I think it is worth it.
If you make one, LMK! I’d love to see it!
🙂 arika
In 2023-24, I work 3 days/week as the only librarian for preschool-grade 5, serving 12 classes with ~200 students.
I shared this story on my Instagram1 last week, but it bears reposting.
Not too long ago, the 5th graders were in the library at lunch recess. One was reading HOOKY by @miriambonastre, a graphic novel not in our library. She had brought the book from home. We started talking. It turns out, they all wanted to read the book. I casually mentioned we might need a way for students to recommend titles for the library. The most quiet of the kids shouted NO! She explained that they did that before. That they wrote down books and authors on paper slips. And the books they wanted were never purchased.
Y’all. They didn’t want to write down books because they felt their choices weren’t respected or acknowledged. Trust had been broken. I had work to do.
I listened and thanked them for their thoughts (promising to not have those slips of paper)…then I bought the books that very weekend. And a few more I thought they’d like (books 1&2 in the PAWS series).
I put the titles on a COMING SOON shelf (not yet catalogued titles). This area is not hidden: it’s right near our lesson space.
If only a camera had captured their faces when they came in for class and spotted those books the next week. They were pumped! Pics are from recess as they happily read and chatted (and explored a new series that was on that same COMING SOON shelf).
If you buy it, they will come (and read)5th graders reading HOOKY & PAWS at recess
The morals of the story:
– Listen to your students. If you buy it, they will come (and read).
One brilliant outcome of putting new purchases out like this: loads of kids are seeing the COMING SOON titles. The book doesn’t get just one set of eyes on it – kids come in at recess to grab those titles and silently read, then put them back for later.
Why not show kids the exact books that are COMING SOON?
In a way, it’s nice that they know no one can take these books out of the library quite yet. And it gives me some much-needed breathing space, as I am still figuring out barcodes and spine labels and covers in this new-to-me library.
It’s also nice that the cataloging work won’t languish: the kids won’t let it happen!
Always Your Librarian 