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September 23, 2020

As I update the Notes from a Circle of Readers I have archived most of the previous posts.  I have decided to leave this post as a part of my history.  

I love the students and teachers from PS 360. I was incredibly lucky to have been chosen to serve as their school librarian more than 15 years ago.  Family obligations coinciding with the Covid19 pandemic caused me to make the difficult decision to leave.  Although I am retired from my beloved library, these students and their teachers will always be in my thoughts.

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January 21, 2018

About ten years ago I was walking back from a PD (professional development) meeting at another school.  It was after dismissal time, so some of my students were playing outside.  I passed a group playing Red Light, Green Light.  The student who was "it" put up his hand and said to his friends, "Wait a minute."  He proceded to grill me, where had I been, was I going back to school, would I be in school tomorrow...  His friends got restless, and started to complain.  He turned back to them with a serious face and said "Just a minute!  I have to talk to MY librarian." 

This child's sense of ownership has stuck with me ever sense.  Whenever I am feeling a little bit overwhelmed I remember him and his sense that he owned a piece of me.  I feel incredibly lucky to know that for the kids in my school, seeing them every week gives them a connection to the world of libraries, books and reading.  I feel that I am truly their librarian, and they are my readers.

I have decided to be more public about where I work and what I do.  Although I have grown up with a sense of privacy and a tendency to hesitate before publishing anything "identifiable" on the internet, the world has changed.  I think it is time to write and post on the internet about my work, and the connections between my work and my thoughts about reading, writing and the library.

That said, I will not share students' images or names on this blog unless both the child and their parent haven given explicit permission.