2/25/2015 Workshop Federal Way Library Klarissa

Location: Federal Way Public Library

Time: 5-7

Date: 2/25/2015

We were all in the same room again, and the kids were mostly doing homework and reading. We couldn’t do a craft anyway. Brad and I played with the infant and her older sister since wifi was down. Other kids left to play in the children’s area.

At storytime the boys from last week were there and  ready to listen, but the girl was not. Instead, she was quietly reading out loud to herself from a book. When we moved to a different area to read, I asked if she just didn’t like the story. She said she didn’t want to listen, because she didn’t understand Spanish. And yet, she replied to the librarian,“sí, comprendo español.” I’ve also seen her interact with her mother almost exclusively in Spanish. Questioning her on this, she said that she didn’t fully understand it and it was dumb. I only said Spanish isn’t dumb, and dropped it.

This is an interesting moment for me, because I didn’t know how to respond. How do I create a space where I only speak English, but support and emphasize the children’s Spanish and Latino identities, as a wonderful part of them, not anything to be ashamed of? 

2/18/2015 Federal Way Library Workshop Klarissa

Location: Federal Way Public Library

Time 5-7

Date: 2/18/2015

We were all in one room today, kids and adults. The planned theme was “Using Technology with Kids” as a family workshop, but the women had specific things they wanted to work on.

There were four boys around 6-8 years old present, which was a bit of a pickle as we had only three iPad minis. We tried to encourage them to share, to play games together, such as the word guessing game on the Osmo. The played the word game for a little bit, but then one broke off to play the chef game with the Tiggly, then another wanted to play that game and soon everyone wanted to play that game on their own tablet. It was not as easy to make that a work together game, and so one boy was left out, upset. Although Brad tried for a while, for some reason he was unable to get the other tablets to download games. So I let the other boy use my Surface tablet, though the only game I have is Jetpack Joyride. That started a commotion over everyone now wanting to play that game. It’s never fair with children, is it? I could probably say the same with adults though, we want what they have, not what we have.

Anyway, that didn’t last long as it was then storytime. I sat and listened, amazed with the librarian’s ability to keep the attention of the boys, who were not wanting to stay still. I talked to the storytime librarian for a bit afterwards about children’s programs, the ones she runs and the research she’s done with education. Meanwhile, Brad was playing with the boys in the children’s section, running around on all fours, which was funny to see.

2/11/2015 Federal Way Library Workshop Klarissa

Location: Federal Way Public Library

Time: 5-7

Date: 2/11/2015

Today, there were only two children, one older kid and an infant. Another kid, middle-school age, was doing homework in the back of the adult room. We had planned to make Valentine’s cards, and started to make a few after some negotiation with our one attendee, who wanted to read.

Again we had to move into the adult room at 6, time for storytime. There were a few kids in the children’s section of the library who gathered for storytime, which is good because I had felt bad that the librarian had shown up and there were no kids with us who would sit through storytime. The infant was not feeling well and fussy, the other was reading on her own. Since there was not much for Willa and I to do, we made cards in the back of the adult room. 

2/11/2015 Federal Way Branch Library Workshop Willa

Federal Way Branch Library

February 11^th, 2015

3:30 PM – 8:00 PM

            I brought my car to UW in order to make sure that we had enough room for all of the participants who needed a ride to KCLS. Ivette drove the U-car because though Klarissa and I both completed the certification, we were too nervous to drive the car. Not only was the car new and something I had no experience driving, I was also nervous about having children in the car and added confusion from the number of people in the car as well. We left a little late, but we were able to make it to the library on time. We only had one girl and one baby in the early literacy program. I chose to stay and help with the kids during the tour of the library because I want to make Valentine’s cards for my family and do some crafts. After the tour was over and the children’s story time started, I moved my crafts project into the adult digital literacy space. I made paper cranes for all of the participants while Ivette gave the lesson. I’m not sure that I fully engaged with the discussion, but I did notice some distinct differences between Ivette and Sarah’s teaching styles. Ivette, I think, was much more discursive and had the women teach each other more than Ivette teaching them. I think that is was much more open in terms of a class. Ivette’s style let it be an open forum where people could discuss and Ivette was just the discussion leader. Sarah’s teaching style seems to be much more structured. Sarah still has the women contribute, but Sarah is definitely moving with a purpose of teaching x or y. There was also a lengthy discussion in the car on the way back to Seattle about a man who had come into the room towards the end of the class. I was not in the room so I do not have much to say about the matter, but it seemed to me by way of the discussion that it was a very disrupting force.