Welcoming the Stranger

"And to any new fans we made along the way, I say welcome to our party!  

It's just starting to get going."

-Richard Marx

In the midst of running around today--I have gained a sixth grade English class this semester and have been given a classroom that needs to be set up before the kids enter--I popped back into the library to get a camera so I could then go take photos of Ms. Haderle's posters so that I can recreate them.  In teaching, we share, what can I say?  When I began my work as a librarian I gave all my awesome posters and stuff away to teachers who would use them.  So anyway,  there I am running around, and I pop into the library and a beautiful woman was waiting for me.

"Hi," she said.  "I'm Vanessa Adams.  I'm your new library aide."

Holy cow!  They district did it!  They actually (finally...) hired a library aide for us!  This is really exciting for a number of reasons, the first being that if I'm now going to be teaching for two periods a day, the library would be completely closed during that time without a library aide.   This conversation was heartbreaking for me--every time a teacher asked to bring in a class during periods 3 or 4 I had to turn them away!  This meant books were not getting into the hands of the students who had that teacher.

By the way, getting books into student hands is my number one priority.

This also means that I can divide my work up.  Instead of me doing all the library programming, creating workshops on technology, research, or literacy for teachers to bring their students,  the website, teaching two classes, helping anyone who needs to get into the book room, and all the other stuff--and checking in and out books and making sure the books are shelved, I don't have to worry about the book part any more.  She also said she can help with fixing broken books and starting to import the ones that have been patiently waiting to be put in the library.  These are things that I have let slide due to the overwhelming amount of other activities I do.

So, let me introduce you to Ms. Vanessa:

Ms. Vanessa comes to us from Broad Acres Elementary School and is very excited to be here and work with a new staff.  She loves kids and enjoys reading--and is really looking forward to reading middle school books rather than elementary books.  Her favorite book genre is fiction and family stories.  Her favorite book is Let the Circle Be Unbroken by Mildred Taylor.

Please come by and introduce yourself to Ms. Vanessa!  She is a much needed and very valuable resource to our school.

Happy Reading!