Tales from a Loud Librarian

I know that JK Rowling was speaking to hundreds of thousands of kids across the world, but it felt like she was talking just to us. The 6th graders joined together in Mrs. Bordelon's room to watch this epic event at 11AM on October 11th. (I wonder if Ms. Rowling chose 10-11-12 for her webcast on purpose) Anyway, Ms. Rowling read from The Sorcerer's Stone.  It was truly magical. She talked about some of her favorite parts in the series. Those included introducing the reader to Luna Lovegood, the graveyard scene in The Goblet of Fire and writing Peeves' jingles.  She told us how there is a little bit if her in Harry, Ron and Hermione. Harry is quick to get upset and so is Ms. Rowling. Her humor is very similar to Ron's sense of what is fun. She is quite bookish just like Hermione, and said that as a teenager she would turn to books to find out answers.  You can enter the world of Harry Potter and find out how magical you are, get sorted into a hous...

On Tuesday, May 1st we joined tens of thousands of students around the world as Rick Riordan broadcast live from the Rosicrucian Egyptian Museum to kick off the release of the latest in the Kane Chronicles, The Serpent's Shadow . All of the sixth and seventh graders sat in a classroom with their lunch to enjoy the show. You can see them below.  As the program started, we had trouble with the sound. The volume would only go up so much and with a room of 80 kids, it was hard for them to concentrate on the show. However, the kids are big fans of Riordan's. About half had read the previous books in the Kane Chronicles series. Probably all of them have read one or more of the books in the Percy Jackson series and/or the Heroes of Olympus series. These books fly off the shelves, and there is always someone in the middle of all his works. I am a big fan of Greek and Roman Mythology, so I have read the Percy Jackson books and the Heroes of Olympus. I have not had time to rea...

On November 15th, the 6th graders all gathered in one room to see Jeff Kinney launch his newest book, Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Cabin Fever. He was at the Banks Street School In New York in front of an auditorium of 8 to12 year olds. There were over 800 schools around the county who joined the event via the computer like us.  The video of him talking was shown in a small window on the screen that I could not enlarge. This frustrated the kids, but I had not control over it. He explained how he got started in the book biz and some of the motivation for his work. He also showed a lot of his illustrations. Luckily, the pictures were slides that we could enlarge for viewing. I especially like the "Reading is Fun" that you see on the right.   Half way through the presentation he introduced the two boys, Zachary Gordon and Robert Capron, who play the lead characters in the Wimpy Kid movies. The boys talked about their experiences in making the movie...