Wednesday, May 18, 2016

Guerrilla Storytime

An internal blog post
I attended WLA’s pre-conference all about storytimes.  Part of that session was a guerrilla storytime!  I have been intrigued with the idea of a guerrilla storytime and was so excited to learn the ins and outs of doing one!
American Libraries journal explained that the “theory of Guerrilla Storytime is to create a chance to show the power of storytime in actual practice and offer youth services librarians a chance to meet in person and build their professional networks.”
A group of youth services librarians, and others if they feel so inclined, sit in a circle for an informal sharing of best practices in storytime.  Often a question is posed such as “What do you do when the children are restless during storytime?”  Anyone can then answer the question.  Then someone else can add their ideas and soon you have an armload of ideas that others have used (and that work)!  This usually organically morphs into more questions and more responses and ideas, however, if there is a lull, pre-written questions can be passed out to spark more ideas.
And it’s not just talking!  You get to demonstrate your silly dance, sing your good-bye song, showoff your favorite parachute activity, and the best part…everyone joins in!

The hardest part though was jotting down the words of songs and rhymes and remembering the tunes that were used.
The Show Me Librarian has samples of questions that could be asked to help spark sharing.
I am hoping to do our own district Guerrilla Storytime!

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