King County Library System - Book Talk - August 2008

Talk Time is an opportunity for immigrants and refugees and anyone else who might wish to practice speaking English.  In most Talk Time settings, there are participants and facilitators. These terms are unique to Talk Time and are used because they sound a little less formal than the teacher/student terms used in classes.  Having volunteered as a Talk Time facilitator and coordinator, I have found that though not necessarily recommended for beginners, Talk Time is a safe, friendly, and relaxed environment for practicing and improving conversation skills.  The other great thing about Talk Time is that unlike many of the ESL classes, Talk Time participants don't generally have to register.

Talk Time KCLS

KCLS libraries currently offering ESL classes include Auburn, Bellevue, Bothell, Covington, Fairwood, Federal Way Regional, Federal Way 320th, Kent, Kingsgate, Kirkland, Redmond, and Sammamish.  For exact days, times, and locations see the summer list of In-Library ESL classes from the KCLS website.  Also, be sure the check back in September for a list of Fall classes. 

Useful Resource

Literacy Now, a division of Tacoma Community House, is an organization whose aim is to strengthen adult literacy services in Washington State.  Information on the Literacy Now website is also included in Spanish and Russian. Talk Time Facilitators and anyone else working with immigrants and refugees are required to attend a Volunteer Training through Literacy Now.  I've taken this training twice and recommend it highly.  Not only do instructors give suggestions for working with participants, they also provide information about recruiting volunteers and planning conversation sessions. 

*Image: "Conversation Piece" by Several Bees from Flikr Creative Commons. Attribution-Non Commercial License

Booktalks also let students know about the wide variety of materials that the library offers.  One mother came in this summer and said that no one had sparked interest in reading for her son until he heard a booktalk this spring.  If you have reluctant readers in your classroom, an enticing booktalk could get them excited about reading.  I've heard from more than one student that they had to have the book after they heard the librarian talk about it.

So contact your local library and invite a librarian to come get your students psyched for reading this school year.  

• Doing Business in Washington
• Locate Funding
• Guidance Advice
• Marketing Your Business
• Tax Information

Some of the things you'll find are statistics that are useful in determining your target market, agencies that will give one on one counseling (for free!), and links to tax information.

If you are really adventuresome, and thinking of relocating to begin your business, check out our database:  SimplyMap.  You can check where there are similar businesses in the area, days of sunshine per year and a myriad of other factors that can help you zero in on the best location.  Be sure to start with the online tutorial first!

Like live music? Interested in learning how to put on a show? The Vera Project is a Seattle music-arts center run by and for teens. Yup. That's right. You can attend any of the all ages shows hosted by the VP or you can help produce and organize them. Check out their website for more information.

But wait, there's something for you Eastsiders too. The Redmond Old Fire House is a place for people ages 13-19 to hang out, skate, take art classes, develop pictures, play pool, see live bands, go on field trips, and more. It's free during drop-in.

Last but not least, the library has lots of free things for you too. Free books, movies, music, magazines, internet access, printing, author visits, video games, manga clubs, book groups, writing groups and more. Free information and entertainment, all the time. Check our calendar, get in touch with us or stop by to find out what you can do at your DIY-friendly library.

Know about other free or DIY-spirited things going on in the community for teens? Suggestions welcome...

• If your interview is scheduled before October 1, 2008, you will be tested on the old exam.
• If you apply before October 1, 2008 but are interviewed between October 1, 2008 and October 1, 2009, you can choose to take the old or the new exam
• If you apply after October 1, 2008, or your interview is after October 1, 2009, you must take the new exam

Just browsing at the Black Diamond Library today I had great find. It's the Super Little Giant Book of Picture Puzzles.  This book contains over a hundred different picture puzzles to ponder, and it's small enough to fit in your pocket. If you love puzzles of all kinds like I do, then this is the book for you!

Here are few more just-for-fun non-fiction books:

Toilets of the World. From the rustic to the luxurious, this book includes  photographs of toilets from every corner of the world.

Found: The Best Lost Tossed and Forgotten Items. A book full of lost stuff (notes, photos, drawings, flyers etc.) found by readers; some things are sad, some are crazy, many are hilarious.
 
Ghosts: Caught on Film. Do you believe in ghosts? Could these photos be proof? You be the judge.

• Valley View (morning) and Foster (afternoon) libraries Sept. 20, 27, Oct. 4, 11, 18.
• Maple Valley (morning) and Burien (afternoon) libraries Sept. 20, 27, Oct. 4, 11, 18. 
• Carnation (morning) and North Bend (afternoon) libraries Sept. 20, 27, Oct. 4. 11, 18. 
• Kent (morning) and Auburn (afternoon) libraries Sept. 27, Oct. 4, 11, 18, 25.
• Bothell (morning) and Newport Way (afternoon) libraries Sept. 27, Oct. 4, 11, 18, 25
• Shoreline (morning) and Lake Hills (afternoon) libraries Sept. 27, Oct. 4, 11, 18, 25

Registration is limited, and each library may have different registration requirements so call them for details!

KCLS also has excellent study guides and books, as well as improve your testing vocabulary.  Check these out!

• The Marino mission : one girl, one mission, one thousand words : 1,000 need-to-know SAT vocabulary words
• The Mayan mission : another mission, another country, another action packed adventure: 1,000 new *SAT vocabulary words Zen in the art of the SAT : how to think, focus, and achieve your highest score

Recycling and re-purposing has stealthily become one of my obsessions. Luckily for me and other like-minded folks, the greater Seattle area boasts nearly as many thrift stores, flea markets, and swap meets as it does coffee stands. Maybe you set out to find something specific, like a lamp for your desk, or an outfit to wear to work, but one can never underestimate the happy possibility of laying hands on a treasure that cannot be resisted. Like the old blue birdcage a friend picked up for a song the other day. It merely needed a little extra help to reach its full reusable potential as a porch decoration filled with lush ferns.

One of my favorite stores, The Salvage Studio, is filled with creative uses of good junk and I always get great ideas for using things that I already have (and sometimes don't have). But you don't have to go to their store, because the owners Amy Duncan, Beth Evans-Ramos, and Lisa Hilderbrand, have written a book:
The Salvage Studio: sustainable home comforts to organize, entertain, and inspire.

These ladies are masters of staging gorgeous vignettes. This book is on order for KCLS and due out this fall. While you wait, here are some other titles to try:

Restoration Home

Flea Market Style:  ideas & projects for your world

Creating Vintage Style

Databases are often designed to meet the needs of a broad range of ages so it comes in handy when they offer a feature like the ability to sort or search by general reading level.  Some databases call it "content" level but it really refers to how easy or hard the reading level is as well as how complex the information is in the entry.  If your student is a 4th -6th grader the basic to intermediate levels will be exactly what they need most of the time.  If they are in junior high or high school they can rely on the intermediate or advanced levels to give them the challenge they need.  Sometimes the database is just high level and that's that.  Expanded Academic is University level journals and that just won't be something an elementary or junior high school student will want to deal with usually.

Not every database lets you choose your levels but some of the best school resources do!  The Discovering Collection is a great starting point for research because it covers in-depth reference content for "Geography & Cultures, History, Literature, Biographies, Science and Health"... you know... just about everything!  The very first page you'll see let's you choose the difficulty level of the information.  Below you can see the box in the middle that says Basic and Intermediate. 

And once you're into the search you can see what the difficulty level of an article is by the color coded icons (circle, square, triangle) and you can sort the search to begin with the easiest info and move up from there.

Some require you to use their Advanced Search to choose a general reading level like the American History Reference Collection.

So sometimes it's easy to find the content or reading level search boxes but sometimes it's buried deep and requires some digging and sometimes it just isn't there at all.  Cruise through the databases and see what you can find and if you want to save time (always a good idea) give your local librarian a call and we will work with you to find the databases that best fit your student's needs. 

Summer is almost over and back-to-school is on the brain. If your youngster is headed off to school for the first time this can be an overwhelming experience!

But never fear, the library has great books to help your child adjust to the new routine. Try sharing one of these  books or stop in for a recommendation from one of our friendly children's librarians.

Communication:

No English by Jacqueline Jules

Princess Penelope's Parrot by Helen Lester

Are you a couch potato or do you want to become one? Start watching 1 of over 4,000 television shows available on DVD through the King County Library System.

Can't think of a TV show you'd like to watch? How about...

You can even browse all the television series on DVD in the library catalog. We have comedies, talk and variety shows, and police and medical dramas.

KCLS does not purchase every television show available on DVD. For example, we purchase Emmy winners, but not all the nominees. We try to buy the best television programs from the United States, and some from the United Kingdom and Canada. We look to see if they have been well-reviewed, won awards, or have ties to the Northwest.

If you'd like to learn more about how KCLS selects which DVDs to purchase, please ask a staff member for the "TV Series- Fiction" (p. 96) section of our Collection Development Manual.

There is an online form if you would like to suggest that KCLS buy a DVD.

Happy watching and don't forget to share the remote control with your loved ones.

Read! Laugh! Nap! Not necessarily in that order.

If you've lived overseas, you know how nice it is to see something familiar.  And after grinding through a foreign language all day, it's sometimes nice to browse news from your home country in your own language.  KCLS offers access to various daily newspapers from over 75 countries in the database Press Display. 

Although it's fairly easy to get news online from some countries, Press Display presents the newspaper as it's published, page by page (no classifieds).  Navigation is fairly easy once you try it a few times, and you don't have to wash newsprint ink off your hands after reading.

Press Display offers coverage going back about a month or two (varies) and there are printing/emailing features.  To access the database from home, you will need your library card number.  Click the link above, or just go to the KCLS website ( kcls.org ) and click "Databases".  You can find an alphabetical listing of the databases available on this page.

A final note - most branches carry several foreign language newspapers in house as well, but there's a lot more to choose from with Press Display.

What do the Crusades, the history of Nabisco (National Biscuit Company, by the way), California homestead law, and archival appraisal all have in common?

They are all entries within now-dusty reference tomes (the post-Google reality), and perhaps more importantly, also in one ginormous (a recent Merriam-Webster 'new' word entry) KCLS subscription database called Gale Virtual Reference Library.

And yes, you can always consult Google, but like that proverbial box of chocolates, you never know what you're gonna get.

With hundreds of full text books in 18 subject areas, there's something for just about anyone, from the grade school child to the college student, to the small business owner.  Since the entries are from published encyclopedias and other reference material, you can trust the authority of the information.

You'll need your library card number to access this resource from home, and you'll want to start from the KCLS Databases webpage.

Personally, I prefer the dusty old tomes.  The dustier the better.  Preferably in a dark stairwell.  Hidden for ages.  But who has time for that...?

For those who are riding the bus try Molly Rides the School Bus by Julie Brillhart or Janet Stoeke's The Bus Stop.  And while you're waiting for the bus why not belt out a few verses of The Wheels on the Bus?

Some other gems for the young Kindergarten adventurer are the classic Miss Bindergarten Gets Ready for Kindergarten by Joseph Slate or On the Way to Kindergarten by Virginia Kroll.  Mouse's First Day of School by Lauren Thompson is bright and inviting.  Kindergarten Rocks by Katie Davis is another must read. 

What do these all have in common?  They are relentlessly upbeat and encouraging while at the same time giving your child an idea of what to expect.  Knowing what to expect will help ease your Kindergartener through the classroom door...hopefully with a smile.  Then you can go home and have a good cry.

There are many excellent books about Kindergarten (the first day and more) at your local branch library.  Take a look at the library today.

Bestselling author J.A. Jance will be visiting the Covington Library!!  This free event will be Tuesday, August 19, 7pm.

Jance will be discussing her latest work Damage Control.

The suspense-filled adventures of Cochise County Sheriff Joanna Brady continue as an elderly couple drives off a cliff in Coronado National Monument and a gruesome discovery awaits exposure by the subsiding rains of an ominous thunderstorm.

Do you ever wonder what happens in the library at night after closing?

On August 15th the Maple Valley Library is opening on a Friday night just for teens. We'll have videogames, board games, snacks, and full use of the library for teens only. ALL FREE! For grades 6-12. Click here for more information and to register in advance online.

We had an after-hours event for teens at the Covington Library last week; it was really fun and over 40 teens showed up.

If you can't make it out the Maple Valley Library, check out this creepy video I found on youtube of the Covington Library at 1:00am. I don't know who shot the video. Weird!

There are a few documentaries with ties to Washington State such as "Arid Lands" about the Hanford nuclear site, "The Heart of the Game" about the Roosevelt High School women's basketball team, and "Source to the Sea" about a man who swims the length of the Columbia River.

If you want to see a funny slice of life check out "Heavy Metal Parking Lot."  It is full of short interviews with Judas Priest fans in the concert parking lot. 

If you are interested in making your own documentary, consider taking classes at the 911 Media Center in Seattle or at the Northwest Film Forum.

What's in it you ask? For starters, there are free career assessment tests.  I took one and it said I should be a librarian! 

Writing a resume?  Try using the Resume Builder which is a step-by-step guide to creating a resume. 

The Virtual Career Library has information about finding a job, getting an internship, writing a resume or cover letter, interview tips, and and advice on how to negotiate your salary.

Looking for a good college or want to find out about scholarships? Trying to figure out where to take a distance learning class? It's all in the Testing & Education Reference Center.

The Testing Preparation section includes online access to the most recent study books and practice tests for tests such as the Postal Exam, GRE, SAT, ACT, TOEFL, NCLEX, U.S. Citizenship, AP, and ASVAB. 

While the library does carry many test study books, often the one book you want isn't checked in or there is a long holds list.  Through the Testing & Education Reference Center you can sit home in your pajamas, turn on your laptop, read the entire study guide online, and then take a practice test. 

If you get stuck or have a question, please contact your local library.

At StartDate Online, you can learn more about the different meteor showers happening throughout 2008 and viewing tips so that you will have better luck sighting shooting stars.

KCLS also has a plethora of materials for those interested in astronomy. Junior astronomers might be interested in reading The Everything Kids' Astronomy Book:  Blast Into Outer Space With Stellar Facts, Intergalactic Trivia, and Out-Of-This-World Puzzles by Kathi Wagner and Sheryl Racine or Exploring Meteors by Rebecca Olien.

For example, let's start with a CD called "A Rush of Blood to the Head" by the band Coldplay.  If we look in the catalog we see it has the call number:

1. CD tells us that this is a compact disc. 
2. The CD is assigned a music category such as Jazz or Rock.  That is what the PR stands for, Popular Rock. 
3. COL represents the band's name, Coldplay. 
4. R04.  The R comes from the first letter of the album title "Rush of Blood..." and the 04 is the last part of the music publisher's number that appears on the CD.

If you are looking for a CD and the library doesn't own a copy, consider submitting a request for the library to purchase it.  There is no guarantee that the CD will be purchased, but it never hurts to ask.

Rock on!

As a teen, my summers were filled with good books, lazy days and sleeping in until noon.  Those three months flew by too quickly and by the end of August I was stressing out about the math equations I knew I wouldn't understand and those wretched French Verbs that would twist my tongue in knots.

This seems like a good place to segue into a program for teens ages 12-18 called Twisted Yoga.  This is your last chance for relaxation before hitting the books in September. These workshops will be taught by certified instructor Gina Hagger.  They will be held at the Lake Hills Library on Saturday, August 9th, 10:30-12:00 and Bellevue Regional Library on Saturday, August 23rd 10:30-12:00.  Mats and props will be provided.  Come and relax! 

Was the plea every night when I was growing up. And when I was older it turned into one more chapter...I'm almost done...just 5 more pages...

These are the books that become our favorites, that ones we can't put down or that must be read every night (and possibly twice).

Three times a week Just One More Book podcasts on great children's literature. Episodes are only 5 to 30 minutes long and you can listen in via their website or download to your ipod.

You can browse categories like age of audience, language or subject which should make finding a great book for your child that much easier. Then once you've heard about something good, check it out from the library!

Flickr photo by karynsig, creative commons liscence

i-pod nano
Originally uploaded by Olly M Pus

Last week I introduced the audiobook database OverDrive, a massive collection of downloadable digital content provided for KCLS patrons. Whether you're at home with a cold, on your computer at work, or on a jog around your local park, downloadable audiobooks can help you pass the time in a much more enjoyable way. And over the last month, OverDrive has made listening to downloadable audiobooks even easier by introducing their MP3 Audiobook collection, which expands upon their already wonderful catalog by offering audiobooks that work with Apple's iPod line!

So which media players work best with OverDrive? Well if you're just starting out, you can check out this great list of compatible devices OverDrive maintains. The list is pretty up-to-date, and has a very large number of dedicated media players and media-capable phones. They even provide links to Google Product Searches for each device, to help you find the best price available. As you look through the list, pay attention to the amount of storage each device has. The more storage a device has, the more data it can hold. That means more audiobooks on the device at any one time, which reduces the amount of time spent making room for your next book.

Upcoming performances include Fauré, Schubert, and Dohnányi on August 2nd and 3rd, and an all Dvorák festival on August 9th and 10th.  If you are making the drive out to this wonderful festival, why not bring along some CDs to get you in the mood?

For some instant gratification, here is the first movement of Fauré's Piano Quartet in C minor Op. 15 from the Classical Music Library Database (you will need to enter your library card number to listen).