Ideas

My friend Hornberger and I are having a conversation about nonfiction ebooks. In a recent post I chatted about my students’ eager acceptance of the EBSCO e-Book Academic Collection. Karen, the librarian at Palisades High School, as well as our PSLA Tech Committee co-chair and blogger, decided to test drive the database herself.  She also [...]

April is National Poetry Month and a favorite part of this initiative by the Academy of American Poets is Poem in Your Pocket Day, coming April 18. It's a perfect time to see poetry all around us and reinforce that poetry infuses our lives. How will you be celebrating?

The task for educators is not to drain this sense of open-ended exploration from student-fans but rather to make sure that it is accompanied by the Jiminy Cricket-like voice of critical literacy...

From haiku to animal poems to riffs on classic tales, this season's new poetry titles open readers to the world around them—and some exquisite wordplay.

Many people hold on to the belief that nonfiction writing is “just the facts,” often synonymous with formulaic, dull writing. Nothing could be further from the truth. Writers for young people model both substance and style, and can serve as mentors to their readers.

Can kids garner a passion for literature without Shakespeare, Silverstein, Salinger, or Sendak? Not in the opinion of the "lead architect of the Common Core Standards Initiative." In celebration of National Poetry Month, we offer three titles that illuminate the intersection between the study of poetry and the goals of the CCSS.

In honor of National Poetry Month, School Library Journal shares a variety of books on haiku, a distinctive form of poetry that originated in Japan centuries ago.

While some readers may view particular story elements as clichés, a fan might see them as enduring archetypes...

Opening Day of Loudon County Library's newest facility, Gum Spring Library, has come and gone. More than 6,500 people checked out 14,000 materials in just under five and a half hours, and we issued over 1,100 library cards. And those are just the tangible statistics! Teens finally found a place in their community to call their own! Caretakers can now stop driving 25 minutes to the nearest storytime! An entire region of northern Virginia learned what it feels like to have free resources available to them in their own backyard. The looks of amazement and happiness that I saw on Opening Day filled me with amazement and happiness. The Gum Spring Library has arrived, and we're open for business!