Do You Have a Love for Your Library? We Definitely Do....

As if I don't talk enough about how wonderful our library is, here are two more reasons why I love our library.

1). Cheap books. Like dirt cheap.  Like find change in your pocket, and you can walk home with a new home library collection cheap.

If you have been following along with my posts, you may know that I have made it a habit to check out these "sound box" books for baby bookworm each week.  These books are written by Jane Belk Moncure, who has a great site dedicated to early childhood education (I mention this because you really should check it out). Each book features a different letter and its sound (sometimes it includes blends too), and is full of alliteration (e.g., little f found five fat frogs).  It has cute illustrations, and pairs the pictures with the words. I'm very proud to say that baby bookworm has mastered almost every sound in the alphabet; for example, if I ask her "What sound does the letter d make?" She will give me the correct sound.  Now, she hasn't mastered the reverse, as in, "d..d..what letter makes that sound?" But I'm thinking this isn't too shabby for a 19-month old.  I credit, honestly, a lot of this knowledge to these wonderful books. 

So, a few weeks ago when we were at the library, I noticed that they had "upgraded" these books and finally bought newer editions.  We checked out a new version of the "h sound box". Then, the next time we visited the library, I realized that the older (outdated) sound box series was up for sale - at a bargain price of 12 books for $1.00!  So, yes, I bought 23 of these books (plus Richard Scarry's Best Little Word Book Ever) for all of $2.00.  Now, mind you, baby bookworm's bookshelves are full, but how could I possibly pass up this deal?  The series was missing the "a sound box" and the "f sound box" (which we had just checked out only a few weeks ago). Slightly disappointing, yes, that we wouldn't have the entire series, but I'll live I guess (or at least order the missing books online). 

Our Sound Box Collection

Now, how do baby bookworm and I decide which sound box book we are going to read since we have so many?  We play a game (an educational one, of course). I call it a "fishing game" where baby bookworm gets this little fishing rod that has a magnetic end on it (it's actually from a puzzle of hers), and tries to fish for objects.  The objects are really pictures of objects that I have cut out from magazines or books.  I place a paper clip on the "objects" so that the fishing rod can pick them up (note: the paper clips are a choking hazard, so you need proper supervision to do this activity).  Then, once baby bookworm has "caught" an "object" we read the book that corresponds with the first letter of the object she caught.  So, if she catches a duck, we read the d sound box book.  Baby bookworm LOVES this fishing game.  It's not only teaching her hand-eye coordination, but also some very important phonemic awareness skills. 

Baby bookworm and her fishing rod

Her fishin' objects - I got these from a book on Phonemic Awareness

2). So as if cheap, wonderful books weren't enough, our library gives out FREE concert tickets.  FREE - as in pay nothing!  Not even 10 cents. 

We got 4 completely free tickets to an outdoor orchestra concert overlooking our beautiful city (a $40 value, I think).  So we packed up our blanket, our wine and snacks, our baby bookworm and her books, and headed to the concert early for a little picnic, followed by music.  It was a very lovely weekday treat, courtesy of the library.

Enjoying a picnic, music, and the view - thank you library!

And if our love affair with the library continues, I'm thinking I just may have to get baby bookworm this Little Librarian kit for Christmas!  With all of the books we have accumulated, we just may need to transform our own book collection into a little working library.

The library kit
(a special thanks to a friend who showed me this "toy" - I hadn't forgotten about it!)

Library "Daze" -- Creating a Library Ritual

Ever since she was 4 months old, my baby bookworm and I have visited our local library on a weekly basis.  In the beginning our trips were really about me - I was looking for a good reason to get out of the house (and not spend money), but over time they have really evolved into a mother daughter ritual that we both look forward to each week.  I have always had a love affair with libraries, and I think baby bookworm is beginning to have one too.  Today she told me that she was "excited" as we arrived, and I was excited too - our visit meant new books to read, new things to learn, and new topics to blog about.

Our library ritual for the past year has involved 1) attending the baby story time, 2) play time with other baby and mommy/daddy/nanny pairs, and 3) time spent looking for new books (which is my favorite part)!  So, I thought it might be nice each week to have a blog entry about our weekly adventure to the library, our library day or "daze" if you would. At the very least I think this recurring entry will be a great way to document all of the books that baby bookworm has read (from the library anyway) and my thought processes for choosing these books.

Today our normal ritual changed a little bit, as baby bookworm has now graduated from the baby story time to the toddler or family story time.  The family story time we attended was focused around the topic of Spring; despite the cold and rainy weather it was, alas, the first day of Spring.  To be honest, I have no idea what books were read because I was too busy trying to keep baby bookworm from losing all attention in the activities and stories, a task which was not easy.  The books were not geared toward baby bookworms' age but I thought she did a better than average job at being a good little 15-month listener who was surrounded by children who were in some cases 3 times her age.

After story time, we found a couple of books for the week.  Normally I would have gotten more than 2, but considering I had checked out a huge cookbook for myself, I didn't feel like carrying around a load of books.  The first book we checked out was one that baby bookworm picked out herself.  I think it's important to let her find one book that she's naturally drawn to, for whatever reason.  Not surprisingly, it was an animal book.  The second book we checked out was a letter sound book on the letter d.  Although a skill that is advanced for a 15 month old, baby bookworm has really developed a liking for letters, and knows many of their sounds.  I figured I could reinforce these letter sound associations, which are an important precursor to learning how to read, with this wonderful book series.  I chose the letter d since baby bookworm knows that d makes the "d..d" sound, and "dada" was her first word.

So, here's our library selections for the week.  I think the Splash Splash book will become a favorite, and I'm looking forward to seeing how baby bookworm does with her first sound box book.  There's a lot of words in this book but the pictures are simple, and all things that she can easily identify and can most likely say.  I plan on trying to find our own "d" words in magazines and making a collage as a fun mid-week activity.

Splash, Splash
by Jeff Sheppard and illustrated by Dennis Panek
copyright 1994
A fun book about animals who fall in water and "splash, splash".  It is a great book for toddlers, and would be very appropriate to use as a part of a lesson on animal sounds.

My "d" Sound Box
by Jane Belk Moncure and illustrated by Linda Sommers
copyright 1978
Part of a series of "Sound Box" books that teaches children letter-sound associations through alliteration.  Would be a great book for a kindergarten student, or for younger children who are learning object recognition and word-object pairs (the book has great object labels).

Our D collage that we made from a Pottery Barn Catalogue


I am such an advocate for FREE public libraries and their programming.  We are very lucky to have several excellent ones close by to us.  I hope you are inspired to check yours out soon, if you aren't already a regular at it.