Introduction
Programming is my passion! It’s one of my favorite ways to build community, engage diverse populations, advocate for the library, and just have fun. I have experience both designing and implementing trainings and programs, in a library setting and outside, with adults, teens, and children. My outside teaching experience has also helped me build skills that I can easily apply to a library program or training.
Story Times, Milwaukee Public Library
March 2011 – present
Competencies demonstrated:
- Designs and implements library services to meet the needs and interests of children in the community
- Models and promotes a welcoming, supportive and nonjudgmental attitude toward children and their families and caregivers
- Identifies the need to educate adults who care for children and offers a variety of resources to help them provide improved care and guidance
My background in theatre means I have a flair for the dramatic! I love telling stories, engaging a group, singing, and playing together with children of all ages. I plan and lead weekly and monthly story times for a variety of ages in Spanish and English at a bustling neighborhood branch. Prior to that, I led many of the weekly preschool story times at our busy downtown library. Although I always tailor my story times to the unique mix of ages and language skills of my audience, as a general rule story times run about 30 minutes, with an additional 10 or 15 minutes for a craft. In an average story time, I read 3 – 5 books, broken up with fingerplays, songs, dramatic play, or other forms of storytelling like flannel boards, kamishibai, cut and tell, or acting out the story together. I select developmentally appropriate materials that encourage early literacy skills and foster positive interaction. I also take the opportunity to help educate parents on early literacy, both by focusing on an early literacy skill each week and by modeling engaging read-aloud and read-together techniques. I am always looking forward to my next story time!
See some of my craft samples and flannel board pieces below.
Teen Advisory Board Coordinator, Milwaukee Public Library
April 2011 – present
Competencies demonstrated:
- Involves young adults in planning, implementing and evaluating programs and services
- Partners with organizations within the institution or in the community that have compatible goals and objectives to serve young adults, and develops cooperative services and programs to extend and enhance young adult programs
- Establishes an environment in which young adults receive courteous service and are encouraged to use the library and participate in library programs
- Articulates and communicates to stakeholders the needs of young adults to receive quality library service
- Uses Web tools and social networking communities to engage with and provide services to young adults
- Connects young adults and their families with resources that encourage reading
I’ve just taken on this exciting new role! I can’t wait to learn from our fantastic teens, and work with them to make the physical and digital library as welcoming, useful, and fun as possible. TAB directly plans and implements its own teen programs, helps shape library policies that relate to teens, participates in community service projects, and uses technology and social media to reach other teens and community members. We already have a very successful manga and anime night, poetry slam and contest, gaming tournament, and t-shirt crafting program. We’ve recently launched our teen Facebook page, which will be expanding to include teen-generated book reviews and trailers, and opened an Animoto account to encourage the TAB members to create and edit video. With a library remodel approaching, one of my major goals is to advocate for the creation of a dedicated teen space, which TAB members would help design. Another is to enhance our web presence. I know we’ll continue to grow and improve this year!
- Teen Poetry Contest and Slam – April and May 2011. Our Teen Poetry Contest attracted 233 entries this year! Our teen and adult judges selected 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place in each of three age groups. Some of our winners read their poems to a packed house at the poetry slam! Participation in the slam was great – we filled the room with over 50 attendees, most of whom read, recited, or freestyled a poem. It’s great to see teens take a chance to express themselves through words and gain confidence in front of a crowd!
- TAB Orientation – August 2011. We recruited over 50 applicants for our Teen Advisory Board this year, in addition to our returning members. I hosted two orientation sessions with another TAB coordinator. Each lasted an hour and a half, and included time for the teens to get to know each other, a presentation on the expectations and opportunities in TAB, and a chance to start brainstorming programs and services for the upcoming year. They already have a great dynamic, and came up with fantastic ideas! It’s going to be an exciting year.
Women’s Words: A Story Time for Adults, Milwaukee Public Library
March 2011
Competencies demonstrated:
- Designs, implements and sponsors library programs that offer information, special skills or entertainment
- Demonstrates ability to be creative, promote new ideas and identify a variety of tools and techniques to create interesting and engaging programs
- Aligns programs with the library’s goals and objectives and with the identified interests and needs of the community
- Determines the particular needs of each target audience and designs a variety of programs and services appropriate to them
- Develops programs to acknowledge and celebrate the cultural diversity of the community
- Promotes the library’s programs to the community in coordination with marketing efforts
I’m so excited about this program! In response to a demand for accessible, low-cost cultural programming, I proposed, planned, and implemented this lunch-hour adult story time. (I firmly believe that we never outgrow our love of being read to!) Once a week during Women’s History Month, a librarian provided a live half-hour reading of an excellent short story which focuses on women in history. The first reading, for example, was Susan Glaspell’s A Jury of her Peers. We often have low turnout at regular Central library programs, as very few people actually live in the neighborhood. Therefore, I intented this program to appeal to the downtown workforce, who can easily walk to the library on their lunch hour, as well as to the many people who already come to the library during that time. The story times had a great turnout with quite a few area professionals – my target audience – in attendance! Regulars returned each week and brought friends.
I planned to continue a regular adult story time by developing a team of readers that expanded beyond librarians to include local authors and community members. Also, to reach a wider audience, I made arrangements to podcast the stories and post them to our website along with readers’ advisory tie-ins on our blog. That program had to be put on hold for now because of staffing concerns, but I’m excited to help it happen soon!
Starting a Small Business class, Milwaukee Public Library,
December 2010
Competencies demonstrated:
- Delivers formal training to fulfill objectives of the patron training programs
- Prepares the learning environment
- Practices effective training techniques (presents ideas clearly, employs interactivity, uses a variety of approaches to accommodate learning styles, actively listens to student input, etc.)
- Fosters a positive learning atmosphere, one that respects and values diversity
In this class, I connected a group of entrepreneurs with the library’s resources for business owners. Because it was a drop-in class, the participants ranged from established businesses owners to people with nothing more than an idea and a dream. They came from different industries, backgrounds, and age groups. I accommodated this diversity by consistently soliciting feedback and questions, letting participants guide my examples and focus as I demonstrated various resources, and making space for the participants to get to know and learn from each other. They were also encouraged to seek individualized assistance at the reference desk or simply stay and experiment with the resources and exchange experiences after the class.
During the hour-long class, I demonstrated a variety of helpful websites in several categories: starting/running your small business, demographic research, market research, and industry research. (Click image above for full listing.) For each category, I also shared some of my favorite print resources; there was something to help everybody, in whatever medium makes them comfortable. Despite the wide variety of participants, each learned something to help them improve their business and they all left feeling energized and enthusiastic!
I really enjoy teaching experiences like this, when I can place myself in the role of guide rather than end-all-and-be-all authority. It’s most fun and effective for everybody when we are all able to learn together, adapting as we go.
Children’s Services Directed Fieldwork, Seattle Public Library
March 2010 – June 2010
Competencies demonstrated:
- Designs, implements and sponsors library programs that offer information, special skills or entertainment for children and their families and caregivers
- Provides services and spaces appropriate to the developmental needs of children
- Understands the theories of reading development for children, including early and emergent literacy
A major aspect of this directed fieldwork experience is observing, leading, and designing story times. I observe and assist with baby, toddler, preschool, and family story times, and designed and led toddler, preschool, and family story times. Each story time emphasizes a particular early literacy skill, such as print
motivation or phonological awareness. Resources and information are also provided for caregivers and families. Preschool story times include a craft, which I may design (as in pictured paper plate chicken craft, for a farm-animal themed story time I led.) This is a double-sided, quarter-page handout from my preschool gardening-themed story time, which gives parents information about the story time and familiarizes them with an early literacy skill:
Additionally, I assist with the children’s book group. This month we’re reading Ingrid Law’s Savvy! You can follow my reflections on children’s programming, as well as reference and collection maintenance, at my blog.
Story Time Volunteer, Page Ahead
November 2008 – June 2010
Competencies demonstrated:
- Implements outreach services that increase children’s and families’ use of library services and to reach underserved populations
- Implements library services that meet the needs and interests of children in the community
Page Ahead is a nonprofit dedicated to “giving kids in need the chance to read.” As a story time volunteer, I presented monthly half-hour story times to a classroom of kindergartners in an underserved community. I loved seeing them develop an enthusiasm for reading, along with their early literacy skills! I chose each unit’s theme based on the interests of my class, and sent them home with questions about that theme to discuss with their families. I hope this helped encourage the whole family to continue reading and learning together long after the school year ended.
Teen Programming Directed Fieldwork, Sno-Isle Libraries
January 2010 – March 2010
Competencies demonstrated:
- Designs and implements library services to meet the needs and interests of the young adult community
- Involves young adults in planning, implementing and evaluating programs and services
- Establishes an environment in which young adults receive courteous service and are encouraged to use the library and participate in library programs
- Implements outreach services to increase young adults’ use of library services
I planned and implemented teen programs at two branches of Sno-Isle Libraries, including designing summer reading programs in tandem with the Teen Advisory Group. Also, I helped to lead teen programs, and to promote teen programs and materials through Twitter announcements, blog posts, booklists, and displays. You can read about this experience at my blog:
Information Specialist, Center for Studies in Demography and Ecology
January 2009 – December 2009
Competencies demonstrated:
- Develops training programs to build information literacy skills and to meet other educational needs of users
- Defines desired outcomes for patron training programs and builds a curriculum to meet those
outcomes - Understands the scope and the importance of information literacy (including computer and
media literacy) and defines information literacy goals applicable to the institution - Evaluates training programs, using the appropriate evaluation strategies
- Helps users develop the ability to recognize an information need, meet it and evaluate the results
In helping CSDE faculty and graduate affiliates find the information they needed for book chapters, grant proposals, and papers, I not only answered reference questions but also taught bibliographic searching techniques. I conducted one-on-one consultations with affiliates to help them locate appropriate databases, data sets, and subject headings, as well as to tutor them in powerful search techniques. I also designed rubrics for classes in bibliographic searching and EndNote citation management software, to be taught to groups of new Research Assistants:
CSDE Bibliographic Searching Rubric
I also created a simple evaluation form for the participants:
GRE / GMAT Instructor, Kaplan Test Prep.
December 2007 - November 2008
Competencies demonstrated:
- Delivers formal training to fulfill objectives of the patron training programs
- Prepares the learning environment
- Practices effective training techniques (presents ideas clearly, employs interactivity, uses a
variety of approaches to accommodate learning styles, actively listens to student input, etc.) - Fosters a positive learning atmosphere, one that respects and values diversity
- Accepts feedback on effectiveness of training and seeks opportunities to improve techniques
and behavior
I taught classes of 5 – 15 students of a variety of ages and backgrounds, as well as offered private 
tutoring, in GRE and GMAT test preparation. I received training through the Kaplan Teacher Development Program in the core areas of teaching with authority, engaging a class, building student motivation, and personifying my company with integrity. Through feedback from my students and mentors I improved my teaching techniques, and received consistently positive reviews. These skills will allow me to create an engaging, supportive environment for library programs and trainings. I also gained experience in developing a lesson, which will help me design more effective library programs as well. This is a sample page from a lesson plan:
Coursework: LIS 560, Instructional and Training Strategies for Information Professionals
Spring 2009
Competencies demonstrated:
- Understands the scope and the importance of information literacy (including computer and
media literacy) and defines information literacy goals - Defines desired outcomes for patron training programs and builds a curriculum to meet those
outcomes - Understands and applies basic instructional design principles to design training
- Evaluates training programs, using the appropriate evaluation strategies
This class focused on designing an information literacy training program for adults. I chose a target population, researched its needs, designed a program which took into account a few major educational models, and prepared both a rubric and an evaluation form. The final document can be accessed here:
Coursework: LIS 567, Public Library Services for Youth
Spring 2010
- Designs and implements library services to meet the needs and interests of children in the community
- Works with parents, caregivers and other adults who serve children
In this course, I learned about ways to deliver effective, respectful, and well-rounded service to children and teens. Though we discussed issues related to reference, readers’ advisory, and collections, the focus was on planning programs. I created plans for two programs: an inter-generational book group for children and their caretakers, and a kamishibai story time. (Kamishibai is a traditional form of Japanese story telling which uses picture cards.) Click on the link to view a sample outline.
