TheirSpace - November 13, 2008

Ok - last one to catch up with. This all day teen training had a variety of panelists.

First, Jamie Watson from Harford County showcased some books to help us connect with reluctant readers. Teens are like adults - special readers are a small number with popular readers the largest.

Reluctant Readers
Dormant - likes to read but too busy
Uncommitted - don't feel a need to read but will with a recommendation
Unmotivated - (largest number) reading is dorky - there are no good books - only read "boring" books required for school
Unskilled - truly has a tough time reading

Unmotivated and unskilled want to choose their own books but need a smaller/narrower choice set

Once a book becomes assigned in curriculum it becomes dorky & awful

Katie George at Howard County talked next about Teen Advisory Boards. She addressed the 40 developmental assets that apply to teen participation in libraries and went over the ladder of participation.

Non-participation
1. Volunteers are manipulated
2. Volunteers are decoration
3. Volunteers are tokenized

Participation
4. Volunteers are assigned & informed
5. Volunteers consult & inform
6. Staff initiate, share decisions with Volunteers
7. Volunteers lead & initiate action
8. Volunteers initiate, share decisions with staff

TAB's consist of 2 parts: communication and results

Communication - connectedness, meaning and control - take any one piece away leads to problems

connectedness + meaning = manipulation & abuse
connectedness + control = delinquency
meaning + control = fundamentalism

Effective communication leads to connections, discoveries, understanding and innovation

Results come from teens engaging in the process and having their accomplishments highlighted.


Next several counties presented ideas for teen book clubs.
Lee Farrell of Howard shared her Mother Daughter book club. She prepares ballots and a showcase of possible titles and one of their meetings is to choose the year's titles. They also assign a snack person.

Stefan Freed of Baltimore County shared his experience with a Parent Child book club to be more inclusive. He collected pages of title ideas with notes throughout his time running this club and had several newspaper articles written about his program.

Rachel Hannum of Cecil County shared her teen book club. She has had success with Book Hook
exclusively for 6-8th graders and conducted 3 times a year. They discuss one book every other week for two months. All books are paperbacks and the teens get to keep the books which are purchased by the Friends.

Rachel stresses:
it's not school - keep it relaxed
cater to your readers
offer confidentiality
begin with a silly ice-breaker
always read a short plot summary first
- jog memories and encourage those who didn't finish to talk anyway
ask questions that allow teens to talk about their lives
use multimedia
snacks
get feedback - listen to suggestions


Last came Elizabeth Rafferty and Bryon McDonald from Baltimore County who discussed how BCPL developed their gaming program. Elizabeth gave an overview of why gaming is important. She gave us a handout with lots of good stats and links. I'm working on getting this electronically so I don't have to type it as my fingers hurt from all these posts today. Hopefully, I'll actually get this up soon! :)