September 18, 2013

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ThingLink and Rosen Digital Launch Interactive Image Contest for K-12 Students

By on April 2, 2013 Leave a Comment
Thing Link logo

Encourage your students to harness their creative energies, follow their interests and passions, and put their 21st-century skills to good use. That’s exactly what a contest for K–12 students from ThingLink and Rosen Digital aims to do. Thanks to the new contest, kids have an opportunity to create interactive ThingLink images, connect multiple resources into a cohesive presentation, and share their projects with a large community. And even better, they can win an iPad Mini or an annual subscription to one of Rosen Digital’s online databases.

Filed Under: Industry News Tagged With:

Tulsa City-County Library Offers Safe Place Sites for Youth in Crisis

By on April 2, 2013 Leave a Comment
Safe Place logo

Youth Services of Tulsa, OK, has announced the addition of Tulsa City-County Library’s branches as official Safe Place sites for teens. Safe Place provides runaways and other youth in a crisis a safe place in their own neighborhoods, where they can seek help with issues like abuse, serious family conflicts, and other dangers.

Filed Under: Featured, Programs & Programming, Public Libraries, Teens & YA Tagged With:

The Debut: A.G. Howard, Splintered

By on March 20, 2013 4 Comments
Splintered cover

Alyssa Victoria Gardner is a 16-year-old skateboarder, artist, devoted child, and the great-great-great granddaughter of Alice Liddell, the inspiration for Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, written by Lewis Carroll in 1865. Her mother, Alison, has spent the last decade in Soul’s Asylum, where she eats only food served in teacups and spends her time talking to flowers and insects. Alyssa also hears insects talking, but has not told anyone—since she doesn’t want to follow the same path as her mother. After a visit to Soul’s Asylum that’s particularly disturbing, Alyssa starts to put disparate clues together and realizes that the only way to save her mother and her own sanity is to find the rabbit hole and put Wonderland back together again. In Splintered, which SLJTeen calls “satisfyingly sensual, delightfully dark, and absolutely riveting,” YA debut author A.G. Howard puts a modern-day twist on Carroll’s classic.

Filed Under: Author Interview, Featured, Teens & YA Tagged With:

Book Reviews from Young Adults

By Bookmarked, Patrick F. Taylor Science & Technology Academy, Jefferson, LA on March 19, 2013 Leave a Comment
Nobody's Secret

Nobody’s Secret, the latest offering from Michaela MacColl, continues to get rave reviews. School Library Journal’s reviewer says, “The fast-moving plot makes this a well-crafted page-turner. The dialogue rings true, both to the historical time and to the chronological ages and social status of the characters.” And SLJTeen’s reviewer agrees. M.G. Higgins’s Bi-Normal is going on my to-read list. I just finished listening to David Levithan and John Green’s Will Grayson, Will Grayson, and I’m wondering what advice their openly gay jock Tiny Cooper would give Higgins’s protagonist, Brett Miller.

Filed Under: Collection Development, Teens & YA, YA reviews Tagged With:

YA Underground: A Different Kind of Rating System

By Amy Cheney, Alameda County (CA) Library, Write to Read/Juvenile Hall Literacy on March 19, 2013 1 Comment
Robinson's Hood

After surveying the kids in my facility, I created the following system to rate the books that they’re reading: one star = Wack, two stars = Bootsy, three stars = Koo, four stars = Clean, and five stars = That book Go! A book that’s “clean” is “real.” A book that “goes” has action. For my readers, a book is ideally both action-packed and real. What makes a book either or both? As usual, it’s not that straightforward, but here’s one attempt to decipher the question.

Filed Under: Collective Book List, Read- & Watch-Alikes, Teens & YA, YA reviews Tagged With:

Book Reviews from Young Adults

By Bookmarked, Patrick F. Taylor Science & Technology Academy, Jefferson, LA on March 6, 2013 2 Comments
Cory and student

The leader of our Bookmarked review group, Elizabeth Kahn, is always looking for new ways to keep her students engaged and entertained. Elsewhere in this issue of SLJTeen you can read about a recent visit to her library by Ruta Sepetys, author of the award-winning Between Shades of Gray (Philomel, 2011). She also recently wrangled a stop from Cory Doctorow, who is on the road promoting his latest title, Pirate Cinema (Tor Teen, 2012). Her advice on getting authors to visit your school or library? Just ask—the worse they can so is “No,” and odds are, eventually you are going to hear “Yes.”

Filed Under: Collection Development, Featured, Teens & YA, YA reviews Tagged With:

A Visit from Ruta Sepetys

By Lauren T., Bookmarked, Patrick F. Taylor Science and Technology Academy, Jefferson LA on March 6, 2013 Leave a Comment
Bookmarked and Ruta Sepetys

Last month, the Patrick F. Taylor Science and Technology Academy’s juniors were treated to a talk by Ruta Sepetys, the author of the New York Times bestseller Between Shades of Gray (Philomel, 2011)—and it was engrossing from beginning to end. In fact, we didn’t even want to return to class because we were so enthralled by her.

Filed Under: Authors & Illustrators, Publishing, Teens & YA Tagged With:

Tech Tidbits from the Guybrarian: How Big Is Your Toolbox?

By Phil Goerner, teacher librarian, Silver Creek High School, Longmont CO on March 5, 2013 Leave a Comment
3613toolbox

It may start this way: you’ve just finished the first lunch period, and because of today’s snow, there are massive amounts of students in your library—and a surprising number of them are on task. You’re just now welcoming a social studies class that’s here to work on a research project and use the laptop cart and many of your book club students are bursting through the door excitedly.

Filed Under: Curricula, Standards & Lesson Plans, Resources, Technology Tagged With:

YALSA Teen Summer Reading Website Up and Running

By on March 4, 2013 2 Comments
Teens Reading

The Young Adult Library Services Association (YALSA) has launched its 2013 Teen Summer Reading Teens ReadingPrograms website, featuring lots of great resources that will make your teen programming a raging success. Funded by the Dollar General Literacy Foundation, the site also has information on grants that can help support your summer reading programs. Join now and you’ll get complete access to all the online resources, which will continue to be updated as the summer reading season approaches.

Filed Under: Industry News, Teens & YA, The Young Adult Library Services Association (YALSA) Tagged With:

Music and Game Reviews from Young Adults

By on March 4, 2013 Leave a Comment
Fire Emblem Awakening

There’s just enough on Josh Groban’s new release, All That Echoes, to keep his groupies happy, though he may be stretching it. Fans of Mumford and Sons and The Lumineers can add the “breakout rock band of 2012″ Imagine Dragons to this sound canon. The popular Japanese role-playing game (RPG) Emblem: Awakening makes an impressive debut here in the States, with our reviewer promising “countless hours of serious entertainment.”

Filed Under: Collection Development, Multimedia, Multimedia Reviews, Video Games, YA reviews Tagged With:

‘The Prom Book’ Giveaway: Help When You Need It

By on March 3, 2013 Leave a Comment
The Prom Book

For many teens, prom night is the biggest night of their high school lives. There are so many things to think about—what to wear, who to ask, and how it’s all going to fit on a budget. Some things (like who’ll make their entrance in a pink Hummer limo or who’ll be elected prom queen andThe Prom Book king) can’t be planned for, but for everything else, there’s The Prom Book: The Only Guide You’ll Ever Need (Zest Books, distributed by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, $16.99 paperback; 9781936976287).

Filed Under: Awards & Contests, Nonfiction, Programs & Programming, Teens & YA Tagged With:

Call for LIS Student Scholarship Applications

By on February 20, 2013 Leave a Comment
Proquest logo

ProQuest is seeking applicants for its 2013 Roger K. Summit Scholarship. This scholarship award is given annually to a promising graduate student in library and information sciences, and it’s open to applicants from around the world. The scholarship award is $5,000, and it will be presented at the Special Libraries Association’s annual conference, in San Diego, CA, June 9-11, 2013.

The deadline for applications is April 30, 2013. Applicants must be students who are currently enrolled in an accredited library or information [...]

Filed Under: Awards & Contests, Careers, Librarians & Media Specialists, Publishing Tagged With:

February Giveaways from Chronicle Books

By on February 20, 2013 Leave a Comment
Nobody's Secret

Chronicle Books wants to give SLJTeen‘s readers a sneak peek of three spring 2013 titles for teens. Click on the title links to go to an ARC request form, and you’ll be reading these forthcoming titles in no time!

Under Shifting Glass by Nicki Singer centers around a strange substance in a mysterious bottle that may hold the fate of Jess’s newborn brothers. Its surface swirls with iridescent colors, like something’s inside, something almost like a song, something with a soul. In [...]

Filed Under: Awards & Contests, Collection Development, Industry News, Teens & YA Tagged With:

The Legend of Zelda: Hyrule Historia Hits #1 on NYT Bestseller List

By on February 20, 2013 1 Comment
Hyrule Historia cover

The Legend of Zelda is one of the few video games my son plays that tempts me to park on the couch and watch. Valiant effort, haunting melodies, faerie-like creatures, and lots of swordplay are part of this hero’s journey tale. We even have some Zelda memorabilia around the house, including a not-often-played ocarina. Zelda fans are legion and loyal, and they proved it by pushing The Legend of Zelda: Hyrule Historia, the 274-page chronological account on The Legend of Zelda universe, to the top of the New York Times Advice and Miscellaneous Hardcover bestseller list on February 10, where it still sits as of this writing.

Filed Under: Books & Media, Graphic Novels, Teens & YA, Video Games Tagged With:

Take the Leap with the National School Boards Association, April 12–15

By on February 6, 2013 Leave a Comment
NSBA 2013 logo

Want to strengthen your relationship with the local school board? Or maybe you just need to start one with them? Then the place to go is San Diego, CA, for the 73rd annual conference of the National School Boards Association. Along with educational workshops covering everything from evaluating the superintendent to safety and security, attendees will be treated to keynote addresses from actress Geena Davis, science advocate Neil deGrasse Tyson, and Diane Ravitch, a professor of education at New York University.

Filed Under: Budgets & Funding, Events, Industry News, Schools & Districts Tagged With:

Book Reviews from Young Adults

By Bookmarked, Patrick F. Taylor Science and Technology Academy, Jefferson, LA on February 5, 2013 Leave a Comment
A Corner of White

Our latest column features two contemporary stories, one fantasy, and another take on Out of the Easy. Gayle Forman’s Just One Day illustrates the benefits and dangers of opening up to the world, while Sarah Skilton’s Bruised defends the right to close down and protect yourself. A Corner of White, from Jaclyn Moriarty, explores what can happen to someone who’s trying to balance two worlds, both seemingly real.

Filed Under: Books & Media, Teens & YA, YA reviews Tagged With:

Book Reviews from Young Adults

By Bookmarked, Patrick F. Taylor Science and Technology Academy, Jefferson, LA on January 16, 2013 Leave a Comment
Scarlet

Our teen reviewers from Bookmarked are back up to speed and full of opinions on new and upcoming titles, including a mystery, a dystopian fairy tale, historical fantasy fiction, and yes, an apocalyptic tale involving a virus. If your library has fans of fairy tale retellings, stay tuned for next month’s Media Mania column, which will feature a fine list of titles which are sure to satisfy their fancy.

Filed Under: Collection Development, Teens & YA, YA reviews Tagged With:

#ASCD13 Sham-rocks Chicago: The 2013 Tweet Up

By on January 13, 2013 Leave a Comment
ASCD Sham-rocks

What’s a tweet up? Your chance to meet face-to-face with fellow educators who use Twitter to strengthen professional learning and to connect. This is the second ASCD Sham-rocksannual ASCD Tweet Up, sponsored by Herff Jones Nystrom, a provider of classroom teaching resources. The free event kicks off at 5:30 p.m. CST on Saturday, March 16, during ASCD’s 2013 Annual Conference and Exhibit Show in Chicago.

Filed Under: ASCD, ASCD, Curricula, Standards & Lesson Plans, Events, Industry News Tagged With:

Book Reviews from Young Adults

By Bookmarked, Patrick F. Taylor Science and Technology Academy, Jefferson, LA on December 19, 2012 Leave a Comment
Nobody But Us

Bookmarked really rallied after the Thanksgiving hiatus! We have a fabulous combination of books reviewed this issue, from mystery to thrillers to fantasy, all with a dash or more of romance. The 2012 titles are ready for reading over the holiday break, so get your holds placed now.

Filed Under: Books & Media, Students, Teens & YA, YA reviews Tagged With:

Cocoa and Cram

By on December 18, 2012 Leave a Comment
GHS Cocoa and Cram

One surefire way to get students to beat a path to your library is by offering food. And if you also offer hot cocoa and exam study help, you’re going to have a full house! Librarian Christy DeMeyer (front, left) at Golden High School (CO) experimented with this format last year, and found it so successful that she’s running Cocoa and Cram for a second time during this semester’s finals period.

Filed Under: Events, Librarians & Media Specialists, Programs & Programming, Teens & YA Tagged With:
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