Guest Wednesday! - Les Anderson: Tales of Life in North Saskatchewan

So last week was our Summer Reading Club's last week for 2012, and we were graced with our last Guest Wednesday as well. Last week we welcomed Les Anderson to the Beaver Valley Public Library. Les shared with us the incredible stories of his life and childhood as he grew up in the wilds of northern Saskatchewan!

Les was such a great story teller, he told stories from when he was young ranging from having a pet bear, to his brother having a hunting gun as young as 9 years old! :O

I think it was great for the kids to learn about Les' life and how different the times were. No TV, no iPods, no One Direction! Shocking! Even Rhonda and I had our mouths agape in wonder and awe!

Week 7 - Scary Monsters!?!? with the Young Professors!

So last week the day before our big Park Party, we had a final meeting with the Young Professors! Unfortunately we only had 2 in attendance! Which mad me a little sad, but if was nice! We had Zoe and Chesney at the library and we had lots of fun reading stories about monsters and such!

We started of talking about monsters and playing some games! We read "Kat Kong" by Dav Pikey, which I remember having and reading extensively as a young kid. That book is hilarious! And I love everyone King Kong inspired.

We also read "Where the Wild Things Are" which we all agreed was awesome!

I then unleashed the two Young Professors onto Rhonda's White Board that we set up in the library. I told 'em to draw and create some monsters! and to tell a story about them! Watching them draw, I decided to set up a quick science activity since there were only 3 of us! So as they continued to draw I set up the H2O2 activity that I did with the Mad Scientists during Science Week, you can see the post where I talk about that activity in detail here: http://beavervalleylibrarykids.blogspot.ca/2012/08/week-4-science-week-with-mad-scientists.html

Week 7 - Scary Monsters!?!? AKA Cupcake Madness! with the Little Einsteins!

Mrs. Giles playing some silly monster games with the Little Einsteins and special Guest Spiderman!

So this Tuesday marked our last visit from the Little Einsteins for the Summer Reading Club! Rhonda went all out with the stories, crafts and snacks for this one! And wow! There were a lot of Little Einsteins for today! We had 19 kids and their parents/guardians join us in the morning, and what a lovely day it was!

Little Veronica roaming the shelves

Rhonda started things of choosing some classic songs from her usual repertoire of kids' songs! Then moved on to some games she had prepared that went along with our theme for the week!

After their singing and once the kids had settled into their seats once again Rhonda went on to read a couple of monster books to the kids!

It's so fun to watch Rhonda reading to the kids, the Little Einsteins totally soak it all in and Rhonda is so animated and fun!

One of the books she read through was a Sesame Street book from Grover called "The Monster at the End of this Book". This book is ridiculously hilarious! The first page starts with Mr. fuzzy Grover heeding a warning to the reader, and totally breaking the 4th wall, that their is a monster at the end of this book! :O And Grover warns you, don't turn the page! If you don't turn the page well, then you won't have to see the monster! Right?

Seriously I need an adult size version of that Spiderman hoodie, adorable!

But no no no, Rhonda turned the page, and AH! that definitely makes Grover very anxious and border-line mad!

It's hilarious and the kids loved it! Every page would end with NO! DON'T TURN THE PAGE!!!!! and Rhonda would ask, "Well, should we turn the page!?" to which the kids would all scream "YES!"

In desperation, Grover tried blocking the reader from turning the page, he ties string and even cement bricks the pages, but nothing can withhold the screams and commands of the Little Einsteins!

Final Summer Reading Club Prize Draw!!

Oh! I forgot! We also did our last draw today! Here are the winners!

Little Einsteins: Lauren and Ella

Young Professors: Chesney!

Congrats to the winners! Unfortunately we didn't have a winner from the Mad Scientists as no one checked their Reading Record Logs this week!

Hopefully you all had fun though, reading this summer, I know I did!

Happy Reading!

Tra la la!!! The End of Our Summer!

So this week wraps up our Strange ... But True? Summer Reading Club 2012, yesterday we went out with a bang at the Montrose Park! We had a bouncy castle and carnival games from BV Tool Rentals, a refreshing water park for the kids to frolic in, our tie-dye-ing station all set up, and I had my camera at the ready!

I'll be posting my official post later this week or at the start of next week! I still have to post about our Monster Week with the Little Einsteins and Young Professors and Guest Wednesday with Les Anderson. And plus, I took about 250 pictures at the party! So it's going to take me a while to go through them all, pick out the good ones, and edit them! So please bear (pun! .... get it? no probably not, but Les Anderson talked a bit about bears during his Guest Wednesday visit, no? not funny? ok) - bare with me!

Until then here's a teaser picture from our Party from yesterday! This is a shot of some of the kids in the water park. Just before we started our water balloon fight we got a group picture, here the kids threw the water balloons up high and screamed as they were bombarded by rogue balloons!

Anyways, I just wanted to thank all the kids, Rhonda, the Beaver Valley Public Library, all our fantastic Guests for out Guest Wednesdays, the Trail Daily Times (for putting up with my constant emails and for sending the lovely Breanne Massey to the party to take some pictures and ask questions for the paper!), parents, and everyone for making this such a fun job for me! Thank you, Thank you, Thank you!

Happy Reading! 

Week 6 - To Be or Knot to Be? Möbius Strips with the Mad Scientists!

OM NOM NOM nom nom!

Sadly, last Thursday was our last Mad Scientist meeting at the Beaver Valley Public Library :( since this Thursday will be our Summer Reading Club Party, see my post about that here: http://beavervalleylibrarykids.blogspot.ca/2012/08/whats-happening-this-week-party.html

Today for out theme I thought science is awesome and so far this summer we've had lots of fun looking at science themed stuff, from biology, zoology, chemistry to math, so I thought more science is always a good thing!

Voila! You see? A simple piece of paper, one loop with a twist (Mobius Strip) and a circular loop!

So, the day before I practised my Möbius strip making and paper loop making! The above and below pictures are the before and after of my loops! The fascinating thing about Möbius strips is how simple, yet complex they are! All a Möbius strip is a loop that has a twist through it! (see above picture on the left!)

Tada!

The Strange ... But True? fact about a Mobius strip that makes it so weird, is that it is characterized as a surface with only one side and one edge, WHA- what!?!! right?

But its true and you can totally try it out for yourself its easy! Cut out a strip of paper and give it a twist before you tape your loop! Then with a pen or pencil start in the middle at a point in our loop and draw a continuous straight line down the middle until you connect the line. :O

The Möbius strip was found by two great German mathematicians, August Ferdinand Möbius (for whom the Möbius strip is named for) and Johann Benedict Listing in 1958.

I'm probably not it explaining it right, but there is this great story on YouTube, that introduced me to Möbius Strips! It's a video done by Vihart, who calls herself a Mathmusician and has a YouTube channel full of crazy, awesome math and music related videos that will blow your mind!

Anyways, I played the story of Wind and Mr. Ug for the Mad Scientists, its a good story that may make you cry :( its a little sad but also well told! I'll post the video here for you to watch! Let me know your thoughts!

What's Happening This Week? PARTY!

PA-PA-PAR-PAR-PARTY!!! (P.S. this picture was featured on the second page in the Trail Daily Times today! Much better in colour, though, no?)

So, from all of us at the Beaver Valley Public Library, you are invited to ...

Our Flyer for the Event!

Yay! I'm so excited, yet also a little sad, since this marks our last week of the Summer Reading Club and therefore drawing to a close my time this summer at the Beaver Valley Public Library! :(

Sara, Zoe, Michael and Sam are getting excited for our party this Thursday!

In the meantime though, I am looking forward to the bouncy castle!!!, the tie-dye-ing!!!, and games and just EVERYTHING coming up for the party at the Montrose Park this week! I hope to see you there!

Today, Susan and Stephanie joined me to practise some tie-dye-ing at my house, since we are planning to have a section at the party this Thursday devoted to tie-dye-ing capes! We shall indeed be assembling some super heroes at the party!

Our materials and finished product!

Guest Wednesday! - Hanne Smith: African Tales/Tails

Welcome Sign!!

Hanne giving her presentation!

So my lovely momma is an avid gardener, like seriously, there are plants in our house that are older, taller and much more quieter (as my mom likes to remind me) than me! My mom likes to call them her favourite children ... it really makes my sister, brother and I feel REAL special! Thanks Mom!

Recently, a couple years ago we moved to our new house and the year of my graduation from high school my mom started her new project of renovating her garden with the help of her creative and genius landscape designer friend, Buena! Now that my mom's garden is finished, she's been fostering and weeding like crazy over her outdoor friends. 

So, this year my mom found out about some Bee Pollinator Seminars/Movie Documentary Nights being hosted by Rossland Real Food (see website here: http://www.rosslandfood.com/) where a local entomologist was also going to be hosting some field trips into local farms/gardens give tours that expound on producing bee friendly gardens! 

I, sadly, missed the movie night! The documentary to be shown was called "Queen of the Sun: What Are the Bees Telling Us", here's the trailer: 

Anyways, this summer I made up for my absence by attending 2 of the field trips! One to a lovely local Fruitvale Organic Farm and the other to a quaint and beautiful home garden in Rossland!

And looooooong story short (too late!) that's how I meet Hanne Smith! She works for Rossland Real Food and organized our field trips - and did a fantastic job, I might add!

Library YA Book Review: The Leviathan Trilogy

"Leviathan"
"Behemoth"
"Goliath"

                   by Scott Westerfeld

                   illustrated by Keith Thompson

These books are the reason I type here before you suffering from tired eyes and sleep deprivation, and really it was so worth it!

Goodness me, I love Scott Westerfeld! I discovered the Uglies Series in the Crowe High School Library and then moved on to read most of his well known books: the Midnighters Series, the Uglies Series, the subsequent add ons to the Uglies Series, like the manga for Shay's Story! (I bought it at Crockett's in the Mall back when I thought they were closing and everything was on sale! Perhaps I'll review that in the near future!), and So Yesterday. (FANTASTIC BOOK!)

I also discovered that Scott Westerfeld is a writer friend of my favourite writer, John Green! MAKES ME LOVE HIM EVEN MORE! :) Seriously, so cool.

So I read "Leviathan" the first of the series, a couple of years ago, but I hadn't keep up with the series as the books came out! And I love it when you get the chance to read a series and all the books are already out! No need to wait in anticipation like the pain of waiting for the new Harry Potter, when I was younger! (although sometimes the wait is fun!)

Now first off all these books are gorgeous, they were published on super thick, lovely paper and are adorned with awesome illustrations from Keith Thompson! And plus it reminds me of a steampunk version of Airborn by Kenneth Oppel!! Love Kenneth Oppel! See my review of his newest book, "This Dark Endeavour" here: http://beavervalleylibrarykids.blogspot.ca/2012/07/library-book-review-this-dark-endeavour.html

So I may not be the biggest fan of studying history and stuff like that, but it doesn't mean I can't appreciate it! And I love the premise of this series, it totally reminds me of my favourite videogame "Bioshock" (which you young kids should stay clear of, lest you wish to be sleep deprived and haunted by scary scary zombie-like monsters!! Oh! and its rated M, so definitely stay away!)

Seriously, how beautiful are the inside pages??!?! Look at this map!

But "Bioshock" is set in the past and creates an alternate reality on past events, which I loved, everything looked snazzy and 50's/60's glam.

And with the Leviathan series, the same sort of alternative reality is made where in the past during and before the WWI, the main super powers of the war are divided by two different sciences. For instance, the Central Powers of the German Empire, Autro-Hungarian Empire are referred to as "Clankers", since here in this rewritten version of history, the Clankers are advanced in mechaniks and robotic-like war machines (very steam punk and AWESOME! ... but wait it gets even better!). And the Entente Powers, of the UK, France and Russia, are called Darwinists, and are super advanced in genetically engineering war monsters, that are seriously the coolest of the cool!

So anyways, the two powers don't get along, obviously, and in this story the Archduke Franz Ferdinand has a son named Aleksandar, and following the events of his father's assassination he and his trusty liege make for an escape to Switzerland.

The other half of our story follows a young and daring Scottish girl named Deryn who wishes to join the Air Force of England, however this is during a time were women don't even have the right to vote, much less join the Air Force! She disguises herself as a girl and soon ends up on board the great airship, the Leviathan!

I mean, this series is epic! I read through Behemoth and Goliath in a week and these are action packed books, that are just so fantastical! Plus, Scott Westerfeld is a genius at dialogue and really creating a world that is truly imaginative and amazing (along with the help of the illustrations, which are very beautiful!). I love the way the characters are developed and how each one has a specific way of talking and thinking, for instance the slang of the English Darwinists ("bumrag!") and the German Clankers ("Dummkopf!").

I don't want to spoil too much of the story for you, but if you like epic adventures, READ THESE BOOKS! :) please!

I mean seriously, read it. now. :D

All these books get a legit 5/5 from me! Let me know what you thought of 'em!

Week 6 - A Trick of Light? with the Young Professors!

Time to Colour! Wheeeeew!

So this Wednesday marked the second to last week of our Young Professors programming for the Summer Reading Club! (sad face :( ) The theme we talked about today was "A Trick of Light", so we discussed mysterious and uncertain happenings! We started off talking about sea monsters! So we all coloured some colouring sheets from the Summer Reading Club website: http://www.kidssrc.ca/

This is the colouring sheet we worked on:

After our colouring escapades we read through "Sophie and the Sea Monster" by Don Gillmor and illustrated by Michael Martchenko, a book that I've mentioned quite a few times this week, but you can definitely check out my review for it here: http://beavervalleylibrarykids.blogspot.ca/2012/08/library-childrens-book-review-sophie.html

The kids liked the book, as I read to them I asked them questions and quizzed them on why the moon orbits the earth! Answer: Gravity!

After our story time we went into one of my favourite games, one that I generally call The Human Knot! You've probably played it before, SINCE ITS AWESOME! But here are the rules:

• you probably first want to alert everyone that hands will be held and you will be very very close to each other, so its always good to check that that's okay with everyone!
• now that that's cleared, get everyone to stand in a circle, a fairly close to each other! 
• get everyone to put a hand into the circle and get them to grab another person's hand, only one person should be holding the other person's hand! So no triple holding or grabbing someone's wrist! 
• Once that's done get everyone to put their other hand into the circle and grab someone else's hand, not the same person's hand! OK? OK!
• And now! We have our monstrous knot! Everyone's tangled and bunched and now working together the knot must unwind without letting go of any hands! 
• Make sure the kids don't hurt each other! And for an added challenge tell the kids that not to talk at all! :O It gets tough, and fun! 

Here's some pictures of the Young Professors trying to untie their knot!

Library Children's Book Review: "Sophie and the Sea Monster"

by Don Gillmor
illustrated by Michael Martchenko

Now in one of my previous posts I mentioned this book, "Sophie and the Sea Monster", Rhonda read it to the Little Einsteins this Tuesday and I loved it so I read it twice this week with the Young Professors and the Mad Scientists - who shared and agreed that this was a good book! You can see the post about the Little Einsteins reading this during their Dragon Week here (but I warn you, like all Little Einstein posts, this post is incredibly and astoundingly adorable!): http://beavervalleylibrarykids.blogspot.ca/2012/08/week-6-dragons-with-little-einsteins.html

So this story, written by Don Gillmor, follows a young girl named Sophie who is pestered by her brother about a sea monster under her bed! From the first page we learn about Sophie's many fears and thoughts. She's afraid of anteaters, pythons, bats! She's afraid of losing her homework! And she's also curious as to what holds the moon in the sky and fears that one day the moon will fall from the sky and land on her house!!

The illustrations, it's worth noting, is outstandingly done by the great Michael Markchenko, you may recognize the style from many Robert Munsch books, of which Markchenko illustrated! And I love his illustrations!  

So, to continue the story, Sophie must get up the courage and strength to look under her bed and discover whether or not their is a monster under her bed!

This is a lovely and heart-warming story that I think a lot of the kids could relate to from the pestering sibling, the elaborate and many fears Sophie has, and the sense of courage and curiosity that she has to grow and discover!

As I said, I read this book with the 6-9 and 10-12 year olds and Rhonda also read it to the 3-5 year olds, we all loved it! So it just goes to show how well this book can transition for all kids! The Young Professors laughed non-stop and the Mad Scientists totally related to losing their homework!

So thank-you Mr. Gillmor for a great, short and cute book about being curious and about finding your courage and not letting your fears stop you from having a good time! I give "Sophie and the Sea Monster" a happy 5/5!

Happy Reading!

Library Book Review: YA Fiction "My Favorite Band Does Not Exist"

by Robert T. Jeschonek

(American published I'm assuming so "Favorite" rather than "Favourite")

So I'm in Metrotown Chapters, waiting for my sister's plane to land ... and I thought, let's do a book review! Hurray!

So I finished off this book a couple of weeks ago ... and let me first say that I am a big fan of Young Adult Fiction, how else does one survive high school!? So now, working at the Beaver Valley Public Library, of course my eye is continually wandering back to the Young Adult Fiction area with longing!  And if you haven't checked it out already here's a post where I talk about the YA/Fiction books for YA that I recommend: http://beavervalleylibrarykids.blogspot.ca/2012/07/young-adult-novels-book-list.html

Anyways, this book caught my eye among the shelves and I was impelled by the summary on the inside flap! This book sounded different and interesting. It had this sort of meta-esque quality in how one of the main characters has an anxiety issue in thinking he's stuck in a book and that some ominous "author"/"fate" is in control of his life.

Week 6 - Dragons with the Little Einsteins!

Story time with Mrs. Giles! These kids are absolutely adorable!

So this Tuesday the Little Einsteins had lots of fun stretching their imaginations as the theme this week for the little ones was DRAGONS!!!! 

Rhonda started things off as per usual with the Name Box and some classic songs! 

For stories she read through some dragon books! She also read "Sophie and the Sea Monster" by Don Gillmor and illustrated by Michael Martchenko (known to me as the awesome guy who illustrates a lot of Robert Munsch books!

This is such a cute story and hearing Rhonda read it in such an animated and fun way was awesome! The kids enjoyed it immensely - as did I! It has become a favourite of mine this week, as I took it out to read to the Young Professors and Mad Scientists - who loved it just the same! 

Along with that, Rhonda had set up her felt board and did a lovely rendition of 5 little monkeys, re-warped into 5 little dragons! The kids sand along and had a blast!

Week 5 - Water Week! with the Mad Scientists!!

Today's group shot - check out these Mad Scientists! They be cray-ze!

Oho! A whole week late! Here's what we did last week with the Mad Scientists!

We had lots of fun! We watched for the capillary action of water, water bending, and watched the Hank Green video like the Young Professors! We also continued on our Water Week journey by playing with some waterbeads, which I swear, these Mad Scientists would be content playing with these waterbeads hours on end!

Waterbeads! AW YEAH!

Alicen, Haley and Emily playing with some waterbeads!

Sara, (Chloe behind her!), Caleb, Justice and Chase - barely seen! and Kyleen!

Oh! And we were also informed by Miss Emily that Kyleen's birthday was coming up so we sang some impromptu Happy Birthday Songs! :)

I read to them a story from the book: The Kid Who Named Pluto - and the Stories of Other Extraordinary Young People in Science by Marc McCutcheon. What a fantastic book! Its a compilation of stories of young people discovering and creating things to do with science! I had to interlibrary loan it so unfortunately we don't have it here in Beaver Valley, but do look for it elsewhere! Or even come and interlibrary loan it here, like me!

 We read the story about Venetia Burney, who at the age of 11, suggested the name of Pluto to name the newly found Planet X in 1930!

There are many more stories in the book, of which I would have liked to read with the kids, yet alas! time is always of importance and unfortunately the hour we spend together goes by like lightning!

We ended playing some games! And of course by passing out some waterbeads for the kids to take home! Awesome!

Happy Reading!