Twilight manga/graphic novel

What, you thought it wouldn't happen?  Foolish, foolish thought! More info from EW here (also the source of the screenshot above).  No release date that I've yet found, but I'm sure you won't be able to miss it when it is closer to its publication date...

Cheers

Ruth

The happy life of teacher librarians: Stitch a librarian...

Should you need some stitchery to keep you occupied in those lonely hours when you aren't at work...!!

Find it here (source of the above screenshot).

Cheers (amused ones),

Ruth

PS Apologies to all the bloke librarians out there.  Let Sublime Stitching know what you'd like to see...

PPS.  She's better looking than Nancy Pearl, although she ticks a bunch of the same cliche boxes - bun TICK glasses TICK.  And are we really interchangeable with secretaries???

The Louvre: now in English

Now you can explore the online database of the Louvre, and more, in English.



Click here to explore.

Cheers

Ruth

An interview with Shaun Tan

Michelle Pauli in The Guardian has a long, thoughtful exploratory interview with Shaun Tan, covering his life and work in engaging/illuminating detail.  Read it here.  I found this via a mention on Alien Onion, an excellent blog.

School Library Journal has a long, thorough and definitely worth reading review of Shaun Tan's work by Elizabeth Bird.

You know what? Don’t go asking me who this book is for. Don’t ask me what the age range is, or how you’re going to catalog it, or what kind of person you could give it to for a birthday present. You want an easy book that slots into your preconceived notions of what constitutes children’s literature? Well forget it, sister. This isn’t it. Tales from Outer Suburbia is a book for every human being you know, from the age of nine and up. It’s heartbreaking, and funny, and weird, and smart, and unlike any other book you’ve read up until this point in time. It’s what happens when someone tells you a dream they just had and you end up crying and laughing at the description all at once. It’s brilliant, and I’m inadequate to describe it to you, though I’ll do my best to try.

 Find it here.

I've mentioned his work admiringly before on this blog, and am still charmed that you can get a free .pdf from the publisher of the wonderful, strange, quirky, clever story Eric, from Tales from Suburban Road.  Go on.  Read it.

Cheers

Ruth

Skerricks in the world: word walls and other inspiration

As you can see from the blog header, and elsewhere in this blog, our word walls are an important part of the library, our billboards and statements of purpose. (And beautiful, and fun, and more - we love them and the kids like them too).  I was originally inspired by seeing work done by the Robin Hood library initiative in New York.

It was lovely to see, cruising around blogs in the bloglist over there on the right, that MissLibrarian (at ButYou'reTooLoudToBeALibrarian) has taken this idea and worked out how to use it in her different library space in the UK (hey, that's three continents - US, Australia, Europe!).  Take a look at progress on her word banners here.  Applause!

Jill at CLC Eltham painted a word wall in her library, inspired by ideas she found here - hers looks FANTASTIC!  See it here.

Fiona over at Reader's Random Ramblings has mentioned Skerricks a few times, too - thank you.  I was interested to read her thoughts on learning to be a teacher librarian here and 'what is a library?' here,  and she had some thoughts about whether audiobooks are 'reading' here.

Mrs Mac's extensive and varied ideas for Book Week 2009 (theme: Book Safari) also draw on ideas she's found here - thank you for the mention!

What I love most about this is the stew and soup and brew of ideas we are all sharing, passing around, working out in our own ways, the aha! moment of mine that becomes a fresh aha! moment in your hands, and then travels on its way to others.  I learn so much from others - and appreciate what I do learn, what inspires and encourages me - that it's just grand to be able to return the favour and be a part of the sharing culture of teacher librarianship.

Cheers

Ruth

The happy life of teacher librarians: the fashion edition

Part 1:

A group of Year 11 students were working on creating glossaries of design terms this morning - given the terms, and a pile of different dictionaries, so they can compare/contrast/come up with the best definition for each.

Hmmmm.  Dictionaries.  A tad distracting, as you may be aware.  Full of Exciting words, some rather Illicit.  Or Saucy.  Or, not to wrap it up in clean linen, Entrancingly RUDE.

They were hugely disappointed to discover that the word they pronounced FART-hingalley (I will leave it to you to wonder why the first syllable is emphasised, and what other words they might have been browsing in the F's... ) was not only one I knew (farthingale) but was also able to explain.  Ah.  Poor dears.  Still, they did discover the excitement of dictionaries, although how much progress they made on their glossaries, as opposed to how much they might have made...

Part 2:

In an article (in today's SMH Guide) about the second series of the ABC's The Librarians, actor Robyn Butler says she was delighted to re-open Frances O'Brien's wardrobe, a fashion style she calls "public servant stroke school teacher with a little kick to Community Aid Abroad.  And, it has to be said, comfortable."

Read it and weep.  This is the outsider view of our sartorial splendour as teacher librarians?  Sigh.

The happy, afashionable life of teacher librarians (but hey, she can speak for herself, I checked what I'd worn to work today and it was NOT in her parameters!!!) .

Cheers

Ruth

A free e-story: Boojum

A while ago I read the anthology of pirate stories, Fast Ships, Black Sails, edited by Ann and Jeff VanderMeer: they've edited a number of anthologies in the fantasy/steampunk genres, generally pitched at an adult audience (which isn't to say the stories aren't good for kids, but is to say that the anthologies aren't constructed to eliminate that which might not be considered by some suitable for an adolescent audience).

My favourite story in this anthology, without a doubt, was Boojum by Sarah Monette and Elizabeth Bear.  Black Alice is a space pirate, not a wet pirate, on a ship that is a creature (a boojum); it's a clever clever tale with a twist.  It was one I lent to senior Extension English students to look at as an idea of how a longer short piece of writing might be constructed (since a number of them were writing prose fiction for their major works).

And tootling around on Google in the hols, I discovered that of all the pirate stories in all the world, this one is available online (as described in this blog entry) as an e-story pdf,  Hurrah!  Click here to read BOOJUM!

It has a couple of bits of contextual coarse language in it, so if that's a concern for you read it first before sharing with kids (read it anyway, just because it's good).  It's high school level in its ideas, rather than primary school.  But if you're looking for an e-example of a story to share, try this.

Cheers

Ruth