May: Student Recommended and Favorite Books

Back in April, during National Library Week, we had students write down their favorite books and also recommend books the library did not already own. Every May we then create a display (or displays) that feature all of these books.

To begin we took the lists of books students had recommended and listed as favorites. You might remember the sheets I created for National Library Week:

I then searched our catalog for all the books. If we had them I added those books to a resource list. The books we did not already own I added to a wishlist on Amazon. After I checked that the books were appropriate I ordered them and our wonderful parent volunteers cataloged the books once they came in.

The second step was to type up labels for each book that was recommended. The labels have the name of the student who recommended the book along with a sentence "This book was suggested by.....". I then printed up all the labels and stuck them on light green post-it notes that I trimmed down (not really necessary but easier to remove from the books once the display comes down).

One of our Library Student Assistants came up with the decor idea. She suggested silhouettes that had quote bubbles that gave the illusion that the silhouettes were speaking. In the quote bubbles would be sayings like "I recommended TITLE OF BOOK" or "TITLE is my favorite book." This was such a great suggestion. I did a google search and found several different silhouettes that I brought into Photoshop and sized to approx 6.5". I then printed out all the silhouettes and we cut them out. I made sure to make an even amount of male vs female silhouettes. I then created some quote bubbles in Photoshop and using the lists I had of student recommended books I typed up the different sayings (being sure to pick an even number of boys and girls). I then printed out the bubbles and wrote either a G or a B on the back of each so I could match the right gender with the right gender silhouette.Here are some blank quote bubbles you can add your own text to.

Once it was time to put up the display I put two silhouettes on each shelf and added the quote bubbles. For the top of the display I made two large quote bubbles that said "Student Recommended" in one and "& Favorite Books" in the other.

That's all there is to it!

April: National Library Week!

It's finally here! National Library Week! I am so excited for what we have planned during National Library Week. I wanted to share our ideas with all of you!

First we have our April checkout raffle. Anyone who checks out a book during the month of April is entered in a raffle to win a $25 iTunes gift card. The more checkouts you have the more entries you get. We do not actually write down student names or make them sign a sheet or anything. At the end of the month I will run a report on Destiny for who checked out books and then we will do a random pick.


Second: Post-it Note Art, I already wrote up a post about our post-it note art contest. The first three students to guess the design win cute prizes related to the images they are creating. You can find out more here: http://librarianondisplay.blogspot.com/2014/04/crafts-post-it-note-art.html

Third: Share 2 or more of your favorite books that you have read and loved and get a healthy snack! We are asking students to tell us what their favorite books are. These can be books we already have in the library or books we don't have. We will be turning this into a display the first week of May. Here is the signage and signout sheet:

Fourth: Recommend a book and get a healthy snack! Every year we do  recommend a book  for National Library Week. The student has to recommend a book that the library does not already have (and that is appropriate). They then get a healthy snack. We will then purchase pretty much every book that is recommended, as long as it is YA and appropriate (no elementary level books or Fifty Shades of Grey). The first week of May we do a display where we feature the books and put the student who recommended it's name on the book. Here is the signage and signout sheet:

Fifth: Create a bookmark for the library. Students can design up to three bookmarks for the library. We provide bookmarks to students when they check out a book. The library picks one winner and they will have their bookmark be featured in the library for a year. The winner gets a $25 Amazon gift card. Here is the signage and template:

Sixth: Free Books! Every year we save books that have been weeded or are duplicates. Maybe they were donated and we already had them.... Whatever the reason we have books to give away to the kids. We place them on a cart with a free books sign and let them go wild!:

Besides these six events we also have our interactive displays: Book Spine Poetry and Quotes, Quotes, Quotes. It is a great week to be in the library! Please feel free to use any of the signage or ideas. (The bookmark sign has our library name on it but you could easily replace that in Paint with your own image).