An Oldie But a Goodie

Today, I could not remember how to pronounce Tomie de Paola's name, so I looked it up on the web. Lo and behold, I ran across one of my favorite articles from my Resources for Children course in my MLIS program. Could Jon Scieszka be any funnier? Here is the classic Horn Book article, "Reader's Reqeust, or, You Asked for It" by Jon Scieszka

Web Browser for Autistic Kids

I ran across this AP article by Brian Bergstein today. Grandfather builds Web browser for autistic boy Basically, it's about a web browser that was created especially for autistic children to help simplify the web experience. But really, I think this would help any child. The majority of web pages are poorly designed, and for anyone using the web for the first time it's like learning an entirely new way of reading. Simply learning how to click on a link is difficult. For example, on this page alone anything with blue letters is a link, but so are some of the pictures (but, not all of the pictures). We are so steeped in the web, that we forget how hard it was to learn. Every time I help a child with research or finding pictures on the web I am amazed by how much they don't see or don't understand. Simple skills like scrolling down the page, are just something they have never encountered or never been taught. In general, I think librarians need to be assisting patrons more with learning this new information literacy. The anyone-can-do-this attitude leads people to settle for low quality information, and there is so much fantastic content out there that they are missing. Browsers and browser add-ons are underutilized resources in libraries. I wish I knew more about programming myself because I would love to create kid and research friendly browsers. Wouldn't it be amazing if your library had a catalog search right next to the google search on public access computers? Or tabs accessing news and databases right under your patrons noses? Ah, to dream (and to have a team of programmers at my disposal)! Until that day comes, you might find this Zac Browser to be useful on library computers, or simply a recommended resource for concerned parents. More information and the download is available at http://www.zacbrowser.com/.

Need to find a book on a difficult subject?

See the Literature Database at Helping Books Connection. I'm always looking for new resources to help with reference questions, and this may prove to be a useful one. I particularly liked the ability to browse by subject. Unfortunately, it will take some exploration to discover which search terms work best for finding group by age or the like. But still, this could very well find it's way into my regular bag of tricks. For example some of the subject headings are: fairness, honesty, respect, adopted, step-parent, death, illness, bullies.

Children's Book Award Links

One of our fantastic library aides is taking a children's literature course and was asking for assistance identifying different awards for children's books. My favorite two resources I found were... "Book Awards" from Cynthia Leitich Smith's website www.cynthialeitichsmith.com This is a fantastic website anyway with some great booklists and resources, but I'm particularly impressed with the obscure awards she posts in addition to the standard ALA Awards. "Awards and Prizes" from www.childrenslit.com Just when you thought you knew all the awards there could be... you find a website like this. Lots of great links on this one. The website in general has some original book reviews, but all their booklists and resources are links to other sites-- in any case, it's still fun to browse. My SLIS program had access to their Children's Literature Comprehensive Database, which, by the way, is great. I wish my library had money to subscribe to it!