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We had our first GSA meeting last Thursday which went very well. It was decided amongst the teens that we would use improv comedy activities for icebreakers. The selected games were found on www.humanpingpongball.com and are listed below:
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Greetings - we edited name titles to things like: King Kong, narcoleptic, scuba diver
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Reverse Chair Dance - similar to musical chairs. As the # chairs dimishes, teens must work together to make sure all feet are off of the ground. The havoc that ensued from these rambunctious alternative rules, somewhat resembled a vertical version of Twister. Seeing half a dozen teens trying to balance upon one chair was a memorable and hilarious Seussical moment.
After the physical exertion, we sat down for discussion and followed the JumpStart manual for newly started GSA groups. This manual was useful and we had to edit very little to make the topics more appropriate for libraries instead of schools. Our accomplished and work in progress mission statement is as follows:
The Gay Straight Alliance (GSA) is a group of individuals with diverse sexual orientations that support people of all sexual preferences. We strive to educate the populace on issues involving diversity and equality; we do this by providing the community with an educational support group that takes a stand against ignorance.
Also coming up this week: Day of Silence Wednesday, April 26, 2006
A few of our GSA members are participating in this event and have created cards to pass out which explains their intent in choosing not to speak.
In the future, I’ll blog our successful GSA ideas in the section of our site where you may find other program activities.
 
Kaavya Viswanathan, a sophmore at Harvard, debut novel How Opal Metha Got Kissed, Got Wild, and Got a Life, is under investigation for plagarism. Some of Viswanathan’s passages bears striking similarities to Megan McCafferty’s Sloppy Firsts. Apparently, fans of the Jessica Darling series, the newest Charmed Life was recently released, informed Megan of this incident via email. Both the NY Times and the Boston Globe cover this news in more detail. Warning: you may need to create a free account with Boston Globe to view the article.
Find better info here: 17th St. Packaged “Opal”
Weekend of 4/14 - 4/16
Author: Julia Baskin and 3 other teen authors
ISBN: 0446578622
Format: Paperback Price: $22.95
Within the past 2 weeks, our particular bookstore has sold 5 copies of The Notebook Girls and one possible stolen copy. Priced at $23 for a teen paperback, it’s a wonder why soo many have sold. It has also been prominently displayed in the teen area, and although I haven’t had any specific requests for this title, its sales show promise to become a very popular book.
Compare this to “Please Kill the Freshman” which covered similar ground, but in a less “everygirl” writing style. Or to the amount of drinking and sex in the Gossip Girls. - Jamie Watson, YALSA-BK comment
New Releases
Weekend of 4/7 - 4/9
Highlighted Titles
Tease: Inspired T-Shirt Transformations
Edited: Sarah Sockit/ISBN: 0399532161
Format: Paperback/Price: $15.95
It seems the DIY community is being recognized for its endeavors with new releases such as: Generation T; 99 Ways to Cut, Sew, Trim, and Tie Your T-Shirt; and Rip It. How many ways can publishers redress the same topic? Although Tease offers appealing photos and easy to follow directions, I’d recommend sticking with Generation T for more teen-savvy styles.
Mental Floss Presents Forbidden Knowledge: A Wickedly Smart Guide to History’s Naughtiest Bits
Edited: Editors of Mental Floss/ISBN:006078475x
Format: Paperback/Price: $14.95
You should already recognize the name Metal Floss and are probably adding it to your order with whatever monies you have left for the fiscal year, or are considering how to promote it to those in charge of the monies. Just as funny as the others, this new release covers more humorous factoids with a risque twist.
New Releases Hardcover
Paperback
Reprints
It’s Kind of a Funny Story
Ned Vizzini
“I think about work, and I freak out about work, and I think about how much I think about work, and I freak out about how much I think about how much I think about work, and I think about how freaked out I get about how much I think about how much I think about work. Does that count as a hobby?”
- Craig, stressed-out high school student
 Once upon a time, we watched the wanna-be-Cool-Kid Jeremy Heere lust after chicks and score the mecha-pill. Two years after the male imbibed fantasies of Be More Chill, Vizzini’s semi-autobiographical character, thoughtful and wanna-be-sane Craig Gilner, battles a more serious issue. In Craig’s world, academic success is an extreme sport. His hard-core dedication towards acheivement coupled with bad friends, poor decisions, and uncontrollable worries, contributes to a particularly bad episode. Craig contemplates suicide and ultimately, checks himself into the hostpital’s pysch ward. Amongst the ward’s crew of eccentric misfits, Craig finds a little bit of love and a bit more hope. Vizzini’s embarrassing honesty and light humor addresses a controversial topic with refreshing frankness.
Male Teen Comment: “The ending may seem slightly unbelievable, but the humor in the beginning is well worth the read. HAHaaaa!”
FYI for teen reader’s advisory folks:
- It’s Kind of a Funny Story has its own myspace account on which Ned frequently responds to teen reader’s comments.
- Size may well be intimidating at nearly 450 pages. However, keep in mind that there are large margins, large text, and lots of dialogue.
- Because sometimes you just need to hollar “EULALIAAAAA!” oh, and other quirky humor inside.
- Teen partying = drinking, drugs, sex, and cockroach killings; but those aren’t the real issues here.
A little while ago I posted about a rock band called The High Strung who are playing at libraries this summer as part of their National Rock and Roll Library Tour. Last night I attended their opening show at the Detroit Public Library and it was a really good time. Their music is a lot of fun, but their presence is what makes it a really cool program. They are all fun, and intelligent guys and that comes across during the show as they make all sorts of jokes and comments about libraries and books.
In addition to playing a great set for about one hour they also talk about what it is like to be in a rock band and to go on tour. They answer questions, although at this show not many people seemed to have questions. Perhaps the most interesting thing they are doing is a segment at the end where they will write a song with the audience and then perform it. This is really a lot of fun. First they asked us for a song style and a chord, or chords, that the song should be in. In this case it was a love ballad composed with the F chord. After deciding this they passed out a bunch of random books they found on the shelves in the library and asked the audience to pick out interesting lines or phrases that would compose the lyrics. It was an inventive idea and people found some very bizarre lines. While the song probably won’t make it too far on the next billboard chart, it was pretty good, and really funny.
There is also a fellow who is making a documentary of the tour. I wasn’t fully sure what the purpose was but it seemed to be meant to help promote the concepts of literacy, libraries, and rock and roll. He interviewed a few of us at the show, and in my case asked a lot of questions about libraries, programming, library school, and other such questions. While I am not entirely sure what this documentary will look like it sounds interesting, so if you go to one of the shows this summer keep and eye out for the guy with the camera and feel free to let him interview you.
All in all it was a really cool experience, and the library patrons, who ranged greatly in age, really seemed to love it. If you can get out to one of their library shows this summer I would highly recommend it.
I have been trying to think of some programming ideas that would make a good tie in for Free Comic Book Day. If you have not heard about it Free Comic Book Day is exactly what it sounds like. It is a day where people can go to their local comic book store and receive a free comic. This event is intended to spread the readership of comics and help promote the art form. Free Comic Book Day is coming up soon, on May 6 and I would like to find a way to promote it and use it in our library.
I haven’t done anything yet, but I was thinking about contacting a local comic book store. My hope is that they would be willing to work with us in some way. Ideally the library will be able to get a supply of these free comic books so we could hand them out. Any other programming that could surround the day would also be fun. Some of my ideas are a comic book trading event, graphic novel book discussion group, or simply some fun displays.
If there are any other ideas on how we could tie the library into this day I would be interested to hear them. I think it is a great day for any comic book fan and simply having a display for it so our patrons know about it would be a great start. For more info about the day check out the Free Comic Book Day website, and I will keep you updated on any developments at my library.
During our Teen Advisory Council meetings, I usually incorportate some type of activity that will tie in a new aspect of technology. This past meeting we tried 5x to podcast using Audioblogger; the reason for multiple attempts being that we had to delete all posts with cursing. In order to anticipate these activities, I have the computer ready to go 15 min before we talk business.
As you might expect, during this prelude, the teens cruise the internet showing off their latest finds. Luckily, my group is an older crowd, so we haven’t had any problems with offending anyone with humorous content. This past meeting they were LOL over 2 clips in particular, which you can find on the Newgrounds website. I thought I’d share these with everyone, since we’re always striving to know what’s hot in contemporary teen pop culture.
The Ultimate Showdown of Ultimate Destiny
Rated Teen. A gory sing-along featuring superheroes fighting to the death with no regard for good vs. evil. Warning: You might find yourself humming the tune throughout your work day.
Rules For The Masses
Rated Teen. Foamy runs A-Kon convention particpants through some rules to observe while the gal (don’t know her name) offers some comic relief in the background. Not familiar with Foamy? There are lots of clips available on Newgrounds featuring this hilarious bizarre creature.
I recently returned from my first PLA conference. It was a wonderful, inspiring experience. There were a number of conference sessions focusing on teen services, a good sign, I think, that YALSA has definitely experienced a growth in recent years.
I thought I would just summarize some of the key points from the sessions I went to that pertained specifically to alternate teen services. Perhaps the “biggest” concept that speakers touched on most was the idea of collaboration. Many public libraries are discovering the ways in which partnership can lead to successful teen services. Collaboration comes in many different forms, the first one being with teens themselves. One slogan often repeated was “by teens, for teens and with teens”. Other libraries have found success partnering with their public schools such as the Howard County Library. An entire session was devoted to this program (toolkit can be found at www.hclibrary.org/partners.) It was nice to see how both entities worked so hard to make libraries an integral part of the school curriculum.
Imaginon is another example of a successful collaboration between a public library and local children’s theatre. I’ve always thought one of the best ways for connecting with teens is to follow the mall library tradition that began a few years ago (see King Country Library System) and start building mini branches specifically for teens in places like the YMCA and other youth canteen-like places. These wouldn’t have to be full service libraries, but just enough to peak interests and show teens what’s available for them.
Assessing the success of current teen programs was another area touched on. Patrick Jones was very insistent about never doing a program without a survey at the end. This is, indeed, one of the best ways to know what parts of the program were successful and what parts were not. Attendance doesn’t always provide an accurate assessment. In fact, Jones remarked that many programs with high attendance are sometimes less successful since it often results in less of a “connection” with teenagers. Setting an attendance limit should be seen as not only necessary but developmentally appropriate. Aaron Schmidt from walkingpaper.org had a very interesting alternative to the traditional paper survey. During one of his programs, he set up a questionnaire on his laptop and left it in the back room. That way, teens could leave comments at their leisure rather than doing it in a rush at the end of the program.
Many speakers also voiced the necessity to work towards altering negative attitudes towards teenagers. Mary K. Chelton (who referred to herself as the “oldest living young adult librarian”), talked a lot about the “ideal user syndrome”, that is the idea that teenagers should exhibit a certain kind behavior other than the one they are currently exhibiting. For example, “they should be reading books, not playing games”. Patrick Jones, Tricia Suellentrop and Michele Gorman all referenced recent studies in their talk about the teenage brain and how it literally functions and processes thoughts differently from adults, just another reason why providing services that promote positive youth development is so important.
New Releases
(Weekend of 3/24 - 3/26)
Hardcover
A Summer of Kings - Han Nolan
Darkhenge - Catherine Fisher
Estrellas Quinceanera - Malin Alegria
Fly on the Wall: How One Girl Saw Everything - E. Lockhart
It’s Kind of a Funny Story - Ned Vizzini
Magic Lessons - Justine Larbalestier
Nothing but the Truth (and a few white lies) - Justina Chen Headley
Skin - Adrienne Maria Vrettos
So Super Stylish - Rose Wilkins
The Book Thief - Markus Zusak
Paperback
Ella Mental: And the Good Sense Guide - Amber Deckers
Pride (The Seven Deadly Sins Series #3) - Robin Wasserman
Some Like It Hot (A-List Series #6) - Zoey Dean
Reprints
Betsy and the Emperor - Staton Rabin
Head Games - Mariah Fredericks
Jude - Kate Morganroth
Vegan Virgin Valentine - Carolyn Mackler
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