Busy Day

I actually kept pretty busy today. I found another job to apply for, then I went into town to talk to some of the librarians about upcoming events. John is still working on his papers every day so I told him I would run errands for him in town. I bought more drain-unclogger and stopped by the pharmacy. Then I came home. So it doesn't sound like much, but it was a pretty day to walk around town.

Book Review

Not much to report today. I wrote a review of the latest book I've read. And, when I was cleaning my office this morning I actually went through the canvas bag I got at the conference on Monday and discovered a free book! It's an advance copy of The Sisters Club by Megan McDonald. It's been a while since I've read a novel for younger readers, but this is a good one to get me back into it. Really enjoyable so far.

Hair

I forgot that one of the problems with having short hair (especially short hair that isn't all the same length) is that you have to cut it pretty frequently to keep it looking nice. My hair really needs a trim, but John doesn't want to authorize that expenditure because:

1. We are waiting on loan money

2. He thinks my hair looks fine (sometimes it's nice when your husband thinks you are beautiful no matter what, but there are drawbacks)

3. He doesn't understand why a cheap salon can't do it (trust me, they can't)

Boys just don't understand these things.

YLG Conference

I went to a conference today for librarians and the focus was on phonics and how children learn to read. The speaker emphasized the need for children to understand what they are reading (not just what individual words mean but what the whole story is about) and enjoy reading. I think what we do as librarians is very important to this goal because by reading to children from a young age and modeling reading aloud for parents we are enabling children to understand and enjoy stories. So, once they start reading on their own maybe that part can come more naturally.

May I say this is why I am not the biggest fan of things like Lexile, because as far as I can tell, the difficulty of the books is calculated only based on how hard the text is to decode. The maturity level of the story and how much it might appeal to a certain age group is not considered at all.

The speaker said that there is no such thing as a book that is too easy, but there are books that are too difficult. Now I have been frustrated when I have seen grade school children flying through board books trying to "cheat" at summer reading. But for a child who is genuinely interested in a book that could be considered below his reading level, if he is going to get something out of it, yeah, what's the harm?

Movie

We walked into town today to see the new Fast and Furious movie. John, because he wanted to see that movie. Me, because there was popcorn involved.

The popcorn at British movie theaters isn't as good as in American theaters (it isn't fresh). But it's better than no popcorn at all.

Colchester Castle

Today I visited Colchester Castle with some staff and volunteers from Ancient House and the children in the Museum Club and the History Club. These clubs both meet regularly at Ancient House where they work on projects, listen to guest speakers, and participate in various other activities. Sometimes they go on trips, like they did today.

There was one adult assigned to every three children. My children were Georgia, Hadyn, and Connor. Georgia wants me to move to England permanently, Hadyn looks like a Weasley (but isn't too mischievous), and Connor prefers the Greeks to the Romans.

We walked down to the parking lot to get on the coach. I wasn't sure how much room there would be so I sat in the seat next to Georgia. After I saw all the empty seats I was sure my kids thought I was lame for sticking so close to them. But I had a nice conversation with Georgia and she asked me to sit with her on the ride back so I guess I wasn't too uncool.

The castle has been converted into a museum, so we started out by exploring the first floor in our groups. My favorite thing was Boudicea's chariot. It is actually the chariot that was used in a movie about Boudicea.

After that we ate lunch, then we went underground where a woman from the museum talked to us about the Romans. Under Claudius the Romans took over the land of the Trinovantes, including the capital city of Camulodunum (which is now Colchester). They made the local people build a temple to Claudius after he died. The underground chambers we were sitting in were filled with sand to support the weight of the temple. When Boudicea led the Britons against the Romans they burned the temple to the ground and took Camulodunum. Later on the Normans moved in and built a castle on top of the temple ruins. They used Roman debris, making Colchester the only red castle.

The woman from the museum led us upstairs where the kids got to handle some Roman artifacts and try their hand at building a round house and a Roman villa. When they were finished we looked around at the rest of the museum. Then we came home!

Dereham

I mentioned that I visited the library in Dereham last Saturday as part of the America Week celebration. Today I visited the school to talk about Americans in Norwich during WWII, partly because of America Week and partly because the third years just started learning about WWII.

So, this morning I showed my PowerPoint and did the paper airplane craft with two groups of 50 children.

Then I ate lunch at a sandwich shop.

Then I went to the library. The third years walked up to the library (in two separate groups of 50, again) to listen to me tell American stories.

The PowerPoint went pretty well. Sometimes I get discouraged because the facial expressions don't change, but all the other adults seem to read that as "paying attention," so I guess that's a good thing.

Every time I have worked with grade school children in England there has been an incident with boys and boobies. Today was no exception. The first classroom I was in had a male teacher and I hung out in the classroom after my presentation because they had just a few minutes before they would go to a short recess. One of the boys in the class pulled his pant leg up and told his teacher to look at his socks. They had a picture of a lady in a bikini. The teacher just laughed and asked him where he had gotten them. He said he borrowed them from his dad.

This afternoon was the first time I got to perform the whole program of American stories I had planned. One of the new things I was trying out was making rattlesnake soup. In my book of American folklore I found a little story about cowboys talking up rattlesnake soup to the new guy until he gets really interested, then laughing at him and telling him they don't eat that stuff. I thought I could adapt the story by making imaginary rattlesnake soup with the kids, allowing them to suggest lots of ingredients, going through all the motions, then instructing them to taste it. After they tasted it I would tell them that we "don't really eat that stuff." Well, it actually went better than I could have hoped because when the kids tasted their soup they immediately started saying, "Ew!" "Yuck!" "You poisoned me!" Very good sports.