The View from the Leslie Library Windows: AR Contact

Wednesday, September 30, 2015

AR Contact

This afternoon after emails from our Language Arts teachers, I emailed the AR people and then decided to just go ahead and call (last time I just emailed, I never got a response~~) after a lovely chat with Zach, I had all the information I needed for the moment and a promise of a price quote in a couple of days. I will also get a phone call from our Oregon account exec and that will be great. Love their new non-fiction program as well. Glad to get that contact set and the wheels turning. Checked out three classes of books today. It was pretty mild. Funny story of the week. A student comes in and has a book from last year. They have had it since May. Then they ask if they can check it out again! I said, 'well, if you haven't read it since May, it might be time to let it go and let someone else have the pleasure of reading it.' They left it with me. I think I heard a heavy sigh! Had a teacher come in and do some laminating and I ran in to tell her to be careful since the rolls were almost out and there came the little tag on her last sheet. So, I ended up changing the rolls today and it worked nicely! Had three students come in from study hall today and wanted on the computers. I really didn't have room for them at the moment since our computer lab had a class in there, and I had students searching for books on those computers. So they decided to just write. After the class that was checking out books was done, I let them on and with our NetSupport, I saw one of the girls immediately start logging into her facebook account. Ah, no! I sent her back to study hall. Also talked with Scholastic today about our upcoming book fair and got a few things set to go for that. After work today, since it was nearly on the way home, I stopped at the Scholastic workshop and had a great time listening to ideas, getting a new cute book (!) and feeling very grateful for all I've been able to purchase for the school. Having a feeling I may give all teachers a 10% discount for anything they buy. Up to what I have on the books anyways! I may do some booktalks as a zombie librarian ~~~ booookkksss, more boookkkksss...

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What I'm Reading

The Butchering Art by Lindsey Fitzharris was a great non-fiction read! Love a good non-fiction! Joseph Lister worked hard, studied hard, never gave up on his ideas that something outside was causing untold numbers of people to die after surgery. His quest to find the answer was long overdue and he was the one to craft it and make it a medical standard. Brilliant!
Uncomfortable Conversations with a Black Boy by Emmanuel Acho was so good. I liked it even better than Stamped. His honest and open look at what is was like for him growing up really brings the issues into focus. Highly recommended!
Verify by Joelle Charbonneau - what if everything went digital which gave the government and people in power a way to change history, past and current. What happened to some words, like the word 'verify' that is no longer in the digital dictionary. Meri has lost her mom and her dad drowns sorrow in liquor. Meri is entranced by her mom's last art pieces and is given a slip of paper (the horror! what about the trees? recycling?) and on it is the word 'verify'. Atlas gives her a dictionary, a paper one and an old history textbook. Meri jumps on the train with him so they can change the world.
Kalahari by Jessica Khoury - what a ride! I even took this home one night to finish! Sarah lives with her dad doing research deep in the Kalahari. A group of students are sent to see if they can qualify for a grant and when her dad goes missing when he heads off after poachers, she is left to take care of them. Her dad doesn't return and the poachers are after them. They come across a white lion stalking them, but wait? It isn't white it's something else. They come across a lab and realize there is a virus, that has been let loose on the Kalahari that could destroy the whole world. So exciting!! Great ending as well!
The Year of the Buttered Cat by Susan Haas with Lexi Haas - Okay. I have to admit that I got this book because of the title. Buttered cats, what an intriguing thought! But the real intrigue is the persistence, the optimism of Lexi. Because of jaundice, she was disabled and this story is about her decision to take a chance on ground breaking surgery to try and get some mobility, speech and live her gifts. She has five she had to find. Read it for Lexi (and maybe to find out about that buttered cat).
Darius the Great is Not Okay by Adib Khorram. There are spaces only you can fill, and Darius learns this as his family travels to Iran to see his grandfather who is dying. Along the way he deals with his depression, makes a friend, has innumerable Star Trek references and also learns that it's okay, to not be okay. I must admit, I had to look up some of the places he got to visit. What a rich heritage. I thought Zoroastrians were long gone, but no, they are still practicing today in Iran. Great book, totally okay.
The Last Bookshop in London by Madeline Martin - perfect book lover tale of a woman captivated by a man and a bookstore and how she made more impact on her fellow book lovers and the man who got her to read than any bomb that fell during the Blitz. Very lovely!
The Girl From the Channel Islands by Jenny Lecoat - Lovely WW2 story by Jenny who actually grew up on one of the Channel Islands. Hedy fled Austria only to find her island haven invaded by the Germans. And though she is wary, she falls in love with a German officer. The twists and turns of German occupation test them both as each find a way to help the allied forces win.
Ancestor Approved edited by Cynthia Leitich Smith. I loved these short stories that all center around a modern day Native American Powwow. My fave was Rez Dog and they were all a great window into culture that I have rarely seen. I watched some videos on Fancy Dancing because of this and I would love to attend one, but feel a bit like a looky loo if I did. Fun, eye opening and full of information. Loved it!
The Dictionary of Lost Words by Pip Williams Loved this fictionalized tale of the daughter of one of the lexicographers of the first ever Oxford Dictionary. As Esme goes from hiding under the sorting table, to one day being a lexicographer herself, we see her story unfold along with the people attached to the dictionary. It was really wonderful as we glimpsed her life and how the words she found and rescued formed the backbone of this novel. Really well done. It will stay on my shelves.