2/4/2015 Federal Way Library Workshop Klarissa

Location: Federal Way Public Library

Time: 5-7

Date: 2/4/2015

Today was the first day at our partner libraries instead of at Casa Latina. It was a bit longer drive to Federal Way than we thought but we got there only a few minutes late. There were a couple older children, and three under-ones, though one would not tolerate being away from mom. Is there a way to be less scary to kids? I’m starting to feel like I must be scary.

I thought the kids might make masks today out of paper plates, and they seemed excited about the idea, but did not get very far, though they did color up some pretty plates. They got distracted and wanted to run around, I guess they do sit all day at school. Although we were not the best planned at getting snacks, and then getting everything moved out of the room, which was otherwise reserved at 6, it did go okay. The story time was wonderful, I sat through it with one of the little ones. The older kids did not want to sit still, and ran off but I was happy to see that they had found another corner of the library to read on their own.

I am always in awe of how kids can make friends so easily, or at least find a way to have fun with people they’ve never met. 

2/4/2015 Federal Way Library Branch Workshop Willa

Federal Way Branch Library (KCLS)

February 4^th, 2015

3:30 PM – 7:00 PM

            Before Ivette, Klarissa, and I headed to Federal Way, we stopped by Casa Latina in order to pick up Sarah and to pick up some of the materials for the program. From there we left for Federal Way. We hit rush hour traffic, which was annoying and kind of stressful because we were starting to run short on time. The GPS said that we would be a couple minutes late and we had to call Edna at one point in order to let them know that we wouldn’t be on time. In the car, we discussed the plan for the day and talked about Klarissa’s essay briefly.

            When we reached the library, Edna had already gotten started on introducing the online library catalog. She had an interpreter with her because she doesn’t speak Spanish. The children were in the room next door. There were too many babies for just Ivette and Klarissa to take care of so I started helping out. However, the young baby I was taking care of could not stop crying without her mother. I decided that it would be better if the baby stayed with her mother and I would help out by entertaining the baby so the mother could concentrate on the lesson. It worked with moderate success. As time went on the baby could sit on my lap without crying, but she liked knowing where her mother was.

            Ivette and I left early around 6:30 PM so that we could go to a poetry reading by Sherman Alexie at Town Hall.

2/4/15 Federal Way Library Sarah

Federal Way Public Library
Feb. 4th, 2015
5: 00 PM  - 7:00 PM

Overview:
The Federal Way branch library was a nice and busy building. Edna gave a very informative overview of library programs at the Federal Way branch. I thought it would be distracting to have an interpreter, but I think it went very well.

The women from Federal Way who attended were an interesting group. The three women in front who seemed like they were used to a formal educational environment - they had notebooks for notes, asked many questions, etc. A different woman seemed very interested in activities for her children, so I imagine that was a motivating factor for her participation.

I had planned some group discussion activities with the idea that the women from Casa and the women from Federal Way could get to talking with each other, but they were reticent to form groups with each other. (I even asked twice....) One woman from Casa was quite distracted by her teething baby, so I understand she wasn't able to fully concentrate on discussion! Another woman from Casa had a laptop with crashing Windows (blue screen; auto restart; blue screen; auto restart) so she was worried and distracted as well. Since my Windows crashed recently, I sympathize! I wanted to spend more time with her to help her troubleshoot, but the group was...well, not big, but big enough...that I couldn't get sucked into open-ended computer troubleshooting land.  Another participant wanted to use her laptop, but couldn't find a good place to plug it in. Since we only used the technology a very short time, I just suggested she use a tablet. I'll bring my power cable next time.

I was surprised that the discussion about finding info only brought up Google. I had thought participants would bring up finding jobs, or information about American institutions/agencies. The discussion evolved in a fairly interesting direction, though. Participants had good insights into the problem of credibility -- one women said, "our kids believe everything they read on the internet. What can we say?" So we discussed evaluating credibility: figuring out the author and their intent, whether they're presenting their opinion, or facts they've researched.