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December 17, 2007

Project for Awesome

As I've mentioned before, I'm a huge fan of YA author John Green's videoblogging project with his eco-geek brother Hank called Brotherhood 2.0. Today they launched the "top secret project" they've been talking about for the past couple of weeks, in which young adults and other Brotherhood 2.0 fans used Youtube to promote their favorite good causes. In Project for Awesome, literally thousands of people have uploaded videos like this one that my 20-year-old son did this morning. If you take a look, you'll see in the list of related videos the same "nerdfighter power" screen,
which each video maker placed in the exact middle of their video before uploading it. And if you click on the videos, you'll see an amazing array of causes dear to the hearts of individual young people. What a great idea, and what a fun way to carry it out!

I love the way young adult literature has moved beyond the early "problem novel" of the 1970s to a time when they combine powerful themes with humor, art, and technology. They still talk about serious issues, but as this project so clearly demonstrates, they also empower young people to work for positive change. Awesome.

Posted by susan at 3:27 PM | Comments (0)

December 7, 2007

Will Hugo Cabret lead to a new book award?

After a vigorous discussion of Brian Selznick's The Invention of Hugo Cabret at NSLS this morning, I came away with the strong feeling that we are on the verge of a change. As most of you know, Hugo Cabret is told both through Selznick's evocative pencil illustrations and through his text--without one of those, you don't have the whole story. One person brought along the audiobook version of Hugo, and explained that in place of the pictures, it uses sound effects--where a picture might show Hugo walking, the audio version uses the sound of feet walking along. So, while the beauty of the pictures isn't there, some of the information being conveyed is.

I think everyone at the table agreed that Hugo is a magnificent book, and fits the bill for the Newbery in being "distinguished". Here's the question: Does the book work well enough through the writing alone to merit the Newbery? And here's the other question: Are we living in a time when it will become necessary through all of the new ways of looking at the world and at literacy to revise the Newbery criteria to fit the whole package? And here's one more question: Would it be better to come up with an award that could encompass works that are both visual and verbal, and may also include other formats as well? And if so, who would sponsor that award? Would ALSC and YALSA each want their own version of it?

I would maintain that according to the Newbery criteria as they currently stand, Hugo relies too much on the illustration to fit the bill. Too much of what I know about Hugo himself, about the setting, and too much of the pacing come through those pictures for the award for writing to go to that book. It fits the Caldecott even less, because as far as I'm concerned, any book that would not be shelved in the picture book section should not win the Caldecott medal.

So that means that one of the year's best books winds up slipping through the cracks completely for the major ALA awards. Too young for the Printz, too many pictures for the Newbery, not a picture book for the Caldecott. I guess I'm in favor of revising the criteria of both the Newbery and Caldecott to better encompass the books of the future. Otherwise, the Newbery medal may come to be associated not just with books that don't especially appeal to kids (a longstanding issue) but also with books that are old-fashioned. We don't need a new award--we need a new way of looking at the Newbery.

Posted by susan at 4:32 PM | Comments (1)

December 3, 2007

What I believe part 2: You have to read!

Here's my first entry on some of the things I am coming to realize that I believe in as a children's librarian/supervisor.

I think it's an absolute necessity for children's librarians to read. Five years ago, it would never have crossed my mind to articulate that thought, but now we all have so many things competing for our time and attention that I suspect we all are reading a bit less than we were. A lot more of our work time is spent on programming at many libraries, and many of us have experienced the big bump you get in activity when your library finishes a building or remodeling project. There just isn't the time on the desk that there used to be for reading.

I'll take it a step further: I believe you have to do some of the reading at home. As a supervisor, I can't tell my staff they have to do that. They're being paid for 37.5 hours of their time, and how they spend their time when they aren't at work however they like. And yet, I don't believe you can be an excellent youth services librarian without reading when you're away from work. I feel like even with my reviewing work and trying to keep on top of the books that are getting a lot of attention, I still barely scrape the surface of the great children's books out there. That's putting aside books written for adults almost completely!

But everything in youth services goes back to the books, and if it doesn't, you aren't doing it right. People doing storytimes need to be constantly refreshing their books so they read them enthusiastically; people out in the schools can't just booktalk what they read in library school; librarians out on the desk may be asked their opinions of the award winners as they come out, and people will think the less of them if they haven't even heard of the books, as we found out last year when the Newbery Committee picked books we had never heard of. You need to be able to offer Readers' Advisory based on more than lexile numbers, and you need to sometimes be able to say to a child as you're off to get the book they've asked for, "I've read that--it's a great book!"

So that's the second thing I believe about being a Children's Librarian: You have to read children's books.

Posted by susan at 1:32 PM | Comments (0)