Where Good Things Happen
April 2009 Newsletter
Volume 1,
Issue 4
From the Director
This month, we celebrate National Library Week, and it has had me wondering about the kind of value people place on libraries these days. Without question, the economic challenges we are facing as a nation have turned many people's attention to the fact that libraries offer free access to the Internet. With a library card, patrons can also check out weekly or monthly magazines, bestselling books, and blockbuster DVDs.all at no cost. Savvy library patrons also know the true value of the online research tools we offer through our Web site - www.wallkillpubliclibrary.org - for homework help for students of all ages, foreign language lessons, genealogical quests, and online testing preparation courses. If you paid personally for these services, it would cost a fortune. Who wouldn't be looking our way these days? Saving a buck, or 20, is certainly worthwhile, but the services libraries provide annually - regardless of the economic state of the country - are a tremendous value in and of themselves.
In this technological age, who is not frustrated by communicating with electronic voices while trying to navigate informational systems?
Doesn't your soul just cry out for a human voice? Am I the only one talking to an electronic voice, pleading for help that does not require pressing the # key and option 7?? Libraries can be the bright light in this situation. We just launched a nationwide search option called "24/7," where you can ask a question, any question, to a real live librarian on call from centers around the country, and get a real live human to entertain your question! The option is available on all RCLS Web sites. Check it out!
One often-overlooked benefit of libraries is the early literacy component. Some may think of this as a buzz word, but I have seen its long-term benefits firsthand. I served as the children's programmer for the Wallkill Public Library for several years. I was very fortunate to witness the value of early literacy while I watched the growth of my story time participants and their parents.
According to the American Academy of Pediatrics, "The human brain achieves approximately 85 percent of its adult size by age 2 years and 90 percent of total growth by age 3. This period of growth corresponds to young child's attainment of important developmental milestones, including emotional regulation and attachment, language development, and motor skills. Studies also show that as much as 90 percent of brain development takes place before age 6, making it a key opportunity to help a child realize his or her potential."
Early literacy is simply helping children to get ready to learn to read. According to the Hennepin County Library Early Literacy Center, there are six skill areas to help your child get ready to read in school:
1. Love books - be interested in and enjoy books as a family. Make reading a special time for closeness between you and your child.
2. Use books - understand that print has meaning, notice print everywhere with your child, not just in books. Teach your child how to hold a book correctly.
3. New words - reading books is a great way to learn words we don't use in everyday talk. Picture books use many unusual words to teach literacy.
4. See letters - knowing that letters look different from each other and have different names and sounds.
5. Make sounds - being able to hear and play with the smaller sounds that make up words. Play with Mother Goose rhymes together.
6. Tell a story - being able to describe things and events and tell stories. Have your child tell you the story you have read a hundred times!
Story Time registration just began at the Wallkill Public Library for the spring session that begins on April 29th. Take advantage of all your library has to offer. Introduce you child to early literacy opportunities, access all of the free services and programming we have to offer, and appreciate the benefits that you have at your fingertips. The Wallkill Public Library is here to serve you. How can we help?
Mary Lou Carolan
Director
The Wallkill Public Library is in the process of reorganizing our archives, but for those of you who are history buffs, there's no need for disappointment - the Historical Society of Shawangunk and Gardiner is looking for new members!
Co-President Carolyn Crowell said that the historical society has archives of its own, including paintings by local artist Eugene Stevens.
The society is also in the process of restoring the Andries DuBois house on Wallkill Avenue. Built in part in the late 1700s, the house is the oldest in the hamlet, and so will aptly serve as the home base for the historical society once its restoration (which includes transforming one of its rooms into a one-room schoolhouse!) is complete.
Some upcoming historical society events include:
· May 6 - a history of the Wallkill Volunteer Fire Company, at the Wallkill Firehouse
· June 3 - the annual picnic at the Gomez house in Marlborough
· Sept. 2 - a program on Eugene Stevens
· Nov. 2 - a meeting at the Gardiner Town Hall for a show and tell of local items of historic interest
The historical society meets the first Wednesday of each month, usually at the Fellowship Hall of the Wallkill Reformed Church. Those interested in attending or joining can call co-presidents Carolyn and Stewart Crowell at 895-3933.
Molokai, by Alan Brennert
Imagine one of your children not only contracting a deadly disease, but being banished to a faraway place because of it, somewhere you weren't allowed to follow and could rarely afford to visit. Imagine being among those who were torn from their families, homes, and jobs, to be shipped off to a strange land, quarantined from all that was familiar.
If it sounds too horrible to be credible, it must be true. That tends to be the way history works, and the above scenario is no exception. With Molokai, Brennert fictionalizes one of America's darker periods, when sufferers of leprosy (or those just suspected of being sick) were hunted down and shipped off to the Hawaiian island of the book's title. We follow the book's main character, Rachel, from age 5, shortly before the leprous mark on her leg is discovered, through to her hospitalization and eventual deportment off Honolulu, away from her agonized family, off to the segregated life on Molokai.
Brennert, who was also a screenwriter for LA Law, describes his characters compassionately, dispelling the images perpetuated by creators of horror film "lepers" who blunder around like zombies with maggots dropping off their faces (as in The Fog). The story here is one of heroic strength, the elastic adaptability of human beings in the worst of circumstances, the altruistic love they have for one another when they're at their best.
For those who wind up reading Molokai and like it enough to want to see how much of it is actually fictional, John Tayman's The Colony details the true story of the island's exiles.
Since 1996, April has been designated National Poetry Month. Started by the Academy of American Poets, the initiative was conceived as a means to broaden the public's attention to poetry and those who write it.
This year, the March 16 death of Nicholas Hughes, son of poets Sylvia Plath and Ted Hughes, was a grim lead-in to a month meant to celebrate poets. and a reminder of their often tragic personal lives. Hughes, like both his mother and stepmother before him, took his own life. He was only 47.
Plath's suicide was a famous one, her mental state having been the focus of her bestselling novel, The Bell Jar. Her fate, unfortunately, was not exactly unique in the world of poetry. Anne Sexton, John Berryman, Sara Teasdale.all succumbed to the suffering they so eloquently captured on paper.
There are those who theorize that the premature deaths of so many poets (and the mental illnesses of so many others) can be explained by the very sensitivity that enables them to so beautifully describe the life they themselves long to escape. But could their work be considered predictors of personal tragedies to come?
A report came out a few years ago that claimed the use of certain words could uncover signs of suicidal tendencies in poets. Published in the journal Psychosomatic Medicine, the study used text-analysis software to compare words used in poems written by nine poets who committed suicide to words used in works written by nine poets who did not.
The poets who committed suicide, it was found, used many more first-person references to themselves than did the non-suicidal poets. Researchers concluded the suicidal poets were more preoccupied with themselves and more detached from others.
Ironically, many readers enjoy poetry specifically because they relate to what the poet's writing about.
Despite the sometimes sad subject matter, poetry remains a popular medium whose fans extend from readers of children's books to the more serious subject matter written by Plath herself. April is the perfect month to reacquaint yourself with books of poetry you may not have perused since high school, so come on in and check them out!
The New York Times Best Sellers
Fiction
1. True Detectives, by Jonathan Kellerman
2. Handle with Care, by Jodi Picoult
3. Outcast, by Aaron Allston
4. The Associate, by John Grisham
5. The Host, by Stephenie Meyer
Nonfiction
1. Liberty and Tyranny, by Mark. R. Levin
2. Outliers, by Malcolm Gladwell
3. House of Cards, by William D. Cohan
4. A Lion Called Christian, by Anthony Bourke and John Rendall
5. The Yankee Years, by Joe Torre and Tom Verducci
April 1-22 - Registration for Spring 2009 Story Time. Caregivers can register their toddlers, ages 2-3, for Wednesday or Friday morning story times at 10:30. Book Buddies (ages 4-5) meet at 1:15 Wednesdays.
April 11 - Easter egg hunt at Wallkill Town Hall, starting at 9:30 a.m.
April 29 - Story Time begins! Program runs through June 5.
May 1 - Deadline for recipe submission for our new Wallkill Public Library Cookbook. The colorful, three-ring binder cookbook will be available in time for the 2009 holiday season.
June 29 - Kick-off event at 6 p.m. for Summer Reading Program, which runs through Aug. 5
The following are either on the shelves or coming soon to the Wallkill Public Library:
Fiction
· Fatally Flaky, by Diane Mott Davidson
· Perfect Fifths, by Megan McCafferty
· Hunted, by Wayne Barcomb
· Death and Honesty: A Martha's Vineyard Mystery, by Cynthia Riggs
· 8th Confession, by James Patterson
· Nobody Move, by Denis Johnson
· Tea Time for the Traditionally Built: The New No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency Novel, by Alexander McCall Smith
· First Family, by David Baldacci
· Secret Keeper, by Paul Harris
· Genesis, by Bernard Beckett
· Geometry of Sisters, by Luanne Rice
· Mr. and Miss Anonymous, by Fern Michaels
· Return of the Mountain Man, by William W. Johnstone
· Home Safe, by Elizabeth Berg
· Plea of Insanity, by Jilliane Hoffman
· Just Take My Heart, by Mary Higgins Clark
Nonfiction
· Showing Up for Life: Thoughts on the Gifts of a Lifetime, by William H. Gates
· Purpose of Boys: Helping Our Sons Find Meaning, Significance, and Direction in Their Lives, by Michael Gurian
· Paula Deen's The Deen Family Cookbook, by Paula H. Deen
Biography
· Always Looking Up: The Adventures of an Incurable Optimist, by Michael J. Fox
Audiobooks
· Fatally Flaky, by Diane Mott Davidson
· Home Safe, by Elizabeth Berg
· Triggerman's Dance, by T. Jefferson Parker
· Sign of the Cross, by Chris Kuzneski
· Golden Chance, by Jayne Ann Krentz
· Prayer for Owen Meany, by John Irving
· Execution Dock, by Anne Perry
· Reinvention: How to Make the Rest of Your Life the Best of Your Life, by Brian Tracy
· First Family, by David Baldacci
· Boneman's Daughters, by Ted Dekker
· Heart of the Sea, by Nora Roberts
· Hard Way, by Lee Child
DVDs
· Secret Life of Bees
· Boy in the Striped Pajamas
· High School Musical 3: Senior Year
· Rachel Getting Married
Come check out our Spanish language books! We have both fiction and nonfiction in our juvenile collection downstairs
Wallkill Public Library
P.O. Box C
7 Bona Ventura Ave.
Wallkill, NY 12589
(845) 895-3707
http://www.wallkillpubliclibrary.org/
E-mail: wak@rcls.org