Guess Who’s Coming to Día?

This year’s featured author for “El día de los niños / El día de los libros” (Day of the Child / Day of the Book) celebration is Alma Flor Ada. Ms. Ada is an internationally known speaker and the author of numerous children’s books such as Gathering the sun: An Alphabet in Spanish and English, The Gold Coin, The Lizard and the Sun and many more. This year’s Día celebration is focusing on families reading and the five best practices to get children ready to read. Given Ms. Ada’s gifts as both a prolific children's book author and a respected scholar of bilingual education, she is the perfect featured guest for this year’s celebration.

 

Ms. Ada will have several appearances in Charlotte:

April 26, 2012  3:30 UNC-Charlotte (Black Box)

April 27, 2012  4:00 Black Forest Books and Toys
April 28, 2012  12:00 ImaginON 
 
Visit Alma Flor Ada’s website at http://almaflorada.com.  For more information on “El día de los niños / El día de los libros,” visit http://dia.ala.org.
 

6 to 5

(Six Skills to Five Practices)

Charlotte Mecklenburg Library Outreach Team with few others CML staff members who involve in Jumpstart project attended the Every Child Ready to Read – New Conversations on Research, Relationships and Partnerships Webinar led by Elaine Meyers, a Consultant from King Ferry, New York last Thursday March 8^th at Beatties Ford Road Regional Library.

From six skills presented in ECRR 1st Edition (Print awareness, Print motivation, Letter knowledge, Phonological awareness, Vocabulary, and Narrative skills) to the new five simple practices to help children get ready to read.

Here are five simple practices that parents and children can enjoy together;

Talking:

Children learn about language by listening to parents talk and joining the conversation.

Books are wonderful conversation starters and learn new words.

Singing:

Songs are a natural way to learn about language. Singing (and rhyming increase children’s awareness or sounds in words. This also helps prepare children to decode print.

Reading:

Reading together with your children is the single most important way to help them get ready to read.

Reading helps children learn less common words.

Writing:

Reading and writing go together.

Writing helps children learn that letters and words stand for sounds and that print has meaning.

Playing:

Children learn about language through different kinds of play such as pretend or dramatic play. Children learn best when they’re having FUN!

One skill--Many practices

One practice – Many skills

Five simple yet powerful practices for the six skills for example talking with children helps develop all six skills featured in ECRR 1st Edition: print awareness, letter knowledge, phonological awareness, vocabulary, narrative skills, and print motivation.

These practices can easily be integrated into everyday activities to help children learn early literacy skills.

To become successful readers, children need to learn a code and understand its meaning.

Reading is learning the CODE.

Decoding is noticing print, knowing letter names and sounds and hearing the sounds that make up words.

Happy Reading to ALL!!!

You can learn more about ECRR 2^nd Edition at www.everychildreadytoread.org

Celebrating African American History Month

Charlotte Mecklenburg Library has always been dedicated to recognizing and celebrating the diversity in our community. Our commitment is evident as library leadership and board members detailed this information in our past and current strategic plan. African American History month was recognized at our branch locations as well as several outreach locations. Daisy Shipp shared her Knot a Wrap program and discussed the history of African American hair wrapping. Shae Movement demonstrated African American history and culture through music, drumming and dance. Staff Members Dot Siler and Connie Ellington participated in the Simmons YMCA Senior Adult African American History Program. Connie Ellington did a phenomenal job involving the seniors in the story, " The Elephant's Wrestling Match." She did a wonderful job using the oral tradition of storytelling and including every participant in the story. Dot Siler presented an Quiz Bowl program highlighting African American history that included our local history in Charlotte. During all of these programs, participants were introduced to the extensive collections of African American literature and resources available at the Public Library.

Knot a Wrap





Connie Ellington at the YMCA Program








Shae Movement



Helping Parents Communicate with Teachers

Charlotte Mecklenburg Library provides library outreach programs at the Latin American Coalition. These workforce development classes are designed to help patrons increase computer skills to communicate, find jobs and create opportunities to enhance employment. Classes at the Coalition are planned and implemented by staff member Irania Patterson. Irania was excited when she connected the content of her class with the students need. Part of the curriculum of the computer classes is establishing an e-mail account. Once the students created the account and practiced it within the class, Irania was not able to tell if the students continued to use the account for communication. The students approached Irania when they wanted to use their e-mail account and computer skills to communicate with their children's teacher, since grades and student information is electronic for Charlotte Mecklenburg School parents. Irania created a lesson that taught parents how to search the CMS website to find their students grades and they used their new e-mail account to communicate with their children's teacher! This was a huge accomplishment for our computer class, but a more important accomplishment for our computer class students. The free services from the library are helping parents access information that helps their child with educational success! For more information on Spanish language computer classes call 704.416.0557 or ipatterson@cmlibrary.org.