DK is known for their amazing informational texts. At ALA this year they were pushing their line of STEAM, Maker, and Coding titles. You can see a few of the books in the image above, but Day 4 of ALA Bites is really about the online resources that you can pair with these titles!
Remember the anime where the kid with the crazy hair used cards to make monsters come alive and battle in an arena? If you do then you realize I am talking about Yu-Gi-Oh! Day 3 of ALA Bites brings a programming opportunity for this incredibly popular anime turned worldwide card game phenomenon. The folks over at Konami, the creators of the card game, want the Yu-Gi-Oh! Trading Card Game to be a part of your library programming. In this new initiative you can have a local Yu-Gi-Oh! Brand Ambassador come to your library to teach your patrons how to play the game! For more information see the scans below! (So many exclamation points!)
Konami contacts:
For demo kit inquiries - us-cardsupport@konami.com
For Brand Ambassador inquiries - us-judgesupport@konami.com
Babylon's Dumbledore Through the Decades celebrate!
This past weekend the 20th Battle of the Books took place at Stony Brook University. This year we had 42 teams come together which is the most in Battle history. We shared with the crowd the history of BotB and how the first one took place in a barn in 1997. The audience was horrified to hear that there was absolutely no air conditioning at that first program. We even heard from Tracey Firestone who was the person that created the county-wide program that year.
She shared some thoughts with us saying, "The Battle of the Books is one of the greatest collaborative efforts I've ever seen. It was the dream of YASD members to have an event, a meeting opportunity, for Suffolk's teens who loved books - a way for there to be some version of the glory the local football team gets. I look back on those years and although I am proud to have been part of the program's history, I am even prouder to have been part of something that lives on, and even has a spin-off Advanced Battle! It's truly a labor of love that's paid back 10x over in the laughter and joy seen in the faces of everyone at the August Battle, supporting their team, as a bunch of idealistic librarians imagined in a meeting back in 1996."
We are so grateful to everyone who participated in the event and made it what it is today. The finals took place last night. After two semi-final rounds, one final round, and two tie breakers Babylon Public Library won! Congratulations to them, our three other final teams Longwood, Patchogue-Medford, Hauppauge, and of course the 38 other teams who made this 20th year of Battle of the Books so fantastic!
To see scores and the winners of the non-scoring awards from the Morning, Afternoon, and Evening sessions check the Battle website at www.suffolkbattle.org.
You've been hearing about them at the last few meetings at SCLS, and they're finally here! The newest batch of Science Buddies Kits and Maker Kits are now available in the lending library! For today's post, we'd like to tell you a little bit about what's inside each kit.
Maker Kits
Our Maker Kits are built for use with teens and tweens, and feature Makerspace and STEM-related crafts and activities! Each kit circulates for two weeks at a time, so you have time to play around with and get used to what's inside.
Ozobot Bits
If you haven't heard of Ozobots yet, get ready to be thoroughly charmed. These adorable, round robots are designed to help teens and tweens learn the basics of coding. Ozobots are programmed to "read" colored marker lines and follow them, changing how it behaves based on the color of the line it's following. The actions it carries out depends on how YOU code it! Each Ozobot Bit Maker Kit (has a ring to it, no?) comes with four Ozobot Bit 2.0 robots, two sets of Ozobot markers, and one iPad Mini loaded with Ozobot apps (which you use to program the 'bots). There are two kits in the lending library for borrowing. Check out the Ozos in action:
Strawbees
Strawbees!! We are so excited about these little guys. Strawbees a prototyping toy for teens and tweens who love to build and fiddle. They are small plastic pieces that come in different configurations, which you use to attach straws to each other. Sounds really simple, right? That's because it is! But the creations you can build out of Strawbees are complex, cool and creative. There's no better way to understand how Strawbees work than by seeing them in action, so check out the video below - it's the pitch video from their successful Kickstarter campaign. The Strawbees Kit comes with Strawbees, Straws, and an Introduction to Strawbees creation booklet. Be sure to check out our Strawbees Pinterest Board for lots of project ideas.
Science Buddy Kits
Science Buddies Kits are designed for use with preschoolers in the 3-5 range. Each kit is designed around a unifying STEAM-based theme. Science Buddies kits circulate for one week.
Diggin' Up Dinos
What toddler doesn't love dinosaurs? And let's be honest, what adult doesn't either? This kit comes with three Dino-themed books and three experiments. In Build-A-Saurus, you'll put together a giant Tyrannosaurus Rex model puzzle as a group, and discuss the names of bones and what paleontologists do for a living. In Dino Egg Observation, toddlers are challenged to use their observational skills to determine what dinosaur each egg will hatch into. By identifying colors, shapes and characteristics, they'll be able to complete a simple matching activity and start down the road to making hypotheses. Finally, in Hunting for Fossils, little ones will become bone hunters as they hunt for hidden dino bones around the room, then match them up to fossil cards - just like real paleontologists!
Light Up Your Life
Light - it's everywhere, and it's waiting for you to start playing with it to unlock fascinating scientific properties! Toddlers will get hands on with light, shadows and mirrors in the three activities this kit comes with. In Fun with Flashlights, toddlers will play with flashlights, prisms,clear geometric solids and mirrors to experiment with what happens to light when you shine it on and through different things. They'll even make a rainbow! In Let's Reflect, break out the art supplies as young artists use mirrors to complete half-formed images, then draw what they see, all while learning about what mirrors do. Finally, in Refraction is Fun, see what water does to light by filling up clear plastic cups with H2O and sticking things in it! They'll never look at light the same way again!
