That'll Be One SLP to Go

Suitcase
Originally uploaded by Lasse C

A few days ago I saw a young father, looking very dejected and confused, wandering in the juvenile fiction section of our library. I asked if he needed help and he explained he wanted an AR book for his son. The young father had no idea about AR books, what they are, or how to find them. Yes, the teacher had given him a paper about AR books at some point, no, he had no idea where the paper was, and he could not remember anything about the testing or how to choose books.

Turns out the young father was divorced and was sharing custody with another parent. He seemed sincerely interested in learning how to help his son with reading but had no idea where to begin. He looked much more confident and relaxed after we searched the AR site our area schools use and perused our collection for the books his son might enjoy.

Before he left, the young father expressed his concern over the loss of reading skills over the summer months. I was excited to step up to the opportunity to let him in on the A-M-A-Z-I-N-G summer library program to support that very concern! Alas, the son was going to be with his mother over the summer. Dad did not seem to think there was a chance in you-know-where that the boy's mother would be taking him to any libraries over the summer.

This May I am going to put together some SLP's to go. My hope is that this humble offering will allow a young father the chance to offer his son the gift of books and the incentive to enjoy learning to read them, even in his absence.

Three Ring Circus

                     We take the circus seriously in New Richmond.

The police escorted the ringmaster and balloons into the Library..............just to be safe.

Enter the Big Top through stripey curtains into the Children's Room

Let the circus begin!

Walk the tightrope, use an umbrella or a balloon flower to help balance.

Eat a refreshing sno cone,

guess how many,

try your hand at THE CLAW machine,

or make a clown hat with a T.A.B. teen.

Get your face painted,

and then try on your very own red rubber clown nose and have your picture taken!

The most wonderful, the most amazing,the most unbelievable, and the most incredible

entertainment, was Ozseeker the clown!

She makes things out of balloons that are not to be believed. 

who knew about balloon motorcycles?

balloon mermaids......

hats made of balloons that are games....

and lovely flower balloon hats.Ahhhhhhhhh

!

My T.A.B. kids were such a help

After everyone enjoyed all of the activities it was time to close the circus. It was another wonderful day at the Library.

Did I mention I have the BEST JOB EVER?

                                                     

Setting Up a Circus in the Library Part One

One might think it is not such a big thing to prepare for a circus in the library. Not so! Erecting a tent without the help of elephants and with children underfoot can really be challanging. We had a little circus pop up tent..........seemed easy enough. We popped it open and proceeded to put the rods through the ........wait.........where EXACTLY DO the rods go? Okay. Now I get it. Georgia holds top of tent. Cynthia crawls in the tent. Georgia feeds the rods in to Cynthia. all seems to be going well when what to our wondering ears should appear but........................loud and very fast footsteps approaching and .............whoa..............................wait...............................oh no!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Three little boys in snowsuits with snowboots lunge into the tent with Cynthia, who, by the way, managed the situation very calmly, unlike me, who above the tent was kinda freaking out!

The idea was to put the tent on top of the bookshelf. Too big. Or on top of a table. Too small. ORRRRRRRRRRRRRR maybe suspend it over my desk.Just right. Now....exactly how do we do this?                                        

          Let's try fishing line woven in a web.

                               Oh no We can't go over, we can't go under it...........oh no.......we'll have to go.....

wrong story. ...............what I meant was, when we got the tent on the fishing line web it was crooked and you could not see the whole tent.

 Plan B...call in Elaine, our trusty maintainence lady, creator of many wonderful display items, bouquets, and master of solving all "technical" issues.

 Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh, that's better.

It's Been a Circus Around Here!

Circus Time Illustrated by one of my faves, Tibor Gergely, was (and still is) one of my favorite books. I have vivid memories from childhood of the circus coming to town every summer. They arrived by train and paraded through town, right past my house, and then to the edge of town, where they set up the tents. One morning, at dawn, my mother came into my bedroom and told me to follow her. She helped me peek out the window and to my amazement, there was a parade of elephants, giraffes, camels, and circus people. I will never forget that magical memory.

 I have always loved any illustration by Tibor Gergley. I keep my copy of the book in my nightstand drawer and look at it often. Inspirations struck and I decided we could recreate a circus at our library to cheer up the families suffering from cabin fever.So..................................
we had a Big Top Breakfast this morning with cereal

                                                                       and juice

                              then we made clown shoes and blew bubbles and did clown dances

then we bouced some balls on a parachute!

Next week---------------
a Lion tamer Luncheon,
and a Three Ring Circus in the evening complete with snow cones and a clown.

Wish Tibor Gergely could have been here to enjoy it with me.