Series and Sequels
The Bettendorf Public Library presents this teen page that lists an amazing number of young adult series.

Survive Dickens’ London
A fun way to spend a little dark and dreary time in Dickens’ London. I could see this being a fun way for kids to learn about Dickens, his books, and the setting.
Via Blog of a Bookslut.

Ready for School: The Case for Including Babies and Toddlers as We Expand Preschool Opportunities
A treatise on the importance of quality care for kids from birth to age three. Quality care is defined as care that focuses on learning, preparing small children to become lifetime learners.

Youth Art Month
This is the perfect month for public libraries to invite the local schools to display art in the library. We have an extensive art display program in the library and save March for the youth of the community to shine.

Holmen Courier – Features
FROM THE PUBLISHER: Time invested reading to kids is time well spent
Yes, I know I am preaching to the choir here, but it is great to have an article actually say that kids who watch TV and play video games can still enjoy books.

no name calling week :: 2004
I found out about No Name Calling Week a little late to do anything at the library, but it would be a great chance to display some of those books for elementary kids that feature bullies and name calling. Our local school seems to be doing a lot of activities around this this year, so I will have to plan a display at the library next year, or a bibliography that the teachers can hand out.

Guardian Unlimited Books: Georgia Byng: books to feed the imagination
Ten books that inspire imagination from Georgia Byng, author of the Molly Moon books.
Via Metafilter.

Center for Children’s Books: 2004 Gryphon Award
Douglas Florian has been announced as the winner of the first Gryphon Award for Children’s Literature for BOW WOW MEOW MEOW, a poetry book. The Gryphon Award focuses on transitional reading.

Studying Hyperlexia May Unlock How Brains Read (washingtonpost.com)
Fascinating article on hyperlexia, a disorder where children begin reading spontaneously at a very young age. This is different from being a gifted or early reader, since other delays are associated with hyperlexia.
“Understanding hyperlexia may also help explain how normal brains accomplish the feat of reading. Unlike seeing and hearing, skills acquired through evolution, reading is usually not acquired naturally. Humans have been reading for only a few thousand years, and the pressure for everyone to become good readers has become intense in only the past couple of centuries.
Reading involves a complex series of brain activities: Visual centers must first perceive variable, tiny features of printed symbols on a page, then those changes must be mentally converted into strings of sound, and finally the patterns of sound must be interpreted by language centers in the brain to register their meaning.”