Library staff and volunteers join me in thanking you for supporting the Library Bond Questions in the November election. 2020 has been a trying year for many in our community who are suffering from illness, have lost loved ones or are enduring financial hardships. Library staff missed seeing our customers during the times the libraries were closed. We have all been frustrated that essential services such as computer access and in person programs for youth have been necessarily restricted. Our connections with individual customers strengthen our community and are valued. We truly look forward to the time when it is safe to resume all our critical services. There is a wealth of materials available through our website. There you will find resources to strengthen educational outcomes and you will find many options for family entertainment.
In 2021, the community will celebrate the opening of the International District Library.
We wish everyone a safe and peaceful holiday season!
Dean Smith
Library Director
As you can see from this drone photograph, progress is being made on the new library that will be located at 7605 Central NE, just east of Louisiana Boulevard. This photo was taken with approval from the FAA and in compliance with all regulations.
The library is scheduled to open in late 2021.
The Board of the Albuquerque Public Library Foundation wishes you a joyful and safe holiday season!
We appreciate your interest in and support of our public library system. Each of you make a difference!
Board members are: Suzanne Apodaca, Julia Clarke, Diane Fleming, Maria Geer, Judy Gibbon, Julia Grimes, John Heidrich, Amy Henne, Scott Perkins, Kathleen Raskob, Rayme Romanik, Dean P. Smith, R. Bruce St John.
Bookworks still has a few autographed copies of Vesper Flights by Helen MacDonald. Follow this link to order.
The Friends of the Public Library have “Fiction to Go” sites in 10 of our libraries and of course, their Friends eBay Store is a wonderful resource. Please continue to check the Friends’ website to learn when the Main Library Bookshop will open and the book sales will resume.
The importance of nonprofit organizations and the essential services they support was acknowledged in the CARES Act provision that impacts all donors. Please see this Internal Revenue Service publication for information as well as this “easier to read” article from the Journal of Accountancy.
Thank you for supporting the Library Bonds in the recent election. Bond funds enable the library system to continue to purchase print and digital materials, ensuring that our collections remain current.
71% of Bernalillo County voters approved the library bond question reminding us that the public libraries are valued throughout our community!
Visitors to the Los Griegos Library enjoy treasures originally created for the 2020 Summer Reading program. Meet “Chantilly,” a large purple dragon created by Rhonda Trujillo. The theme of this year’s Summer Reading Program was “Imagine Your Story” and focused on mythology and fairytales. Unfortunately, the pandemic resulted in library closures, but “Chantilly” and her shark companion “Schmaws” remain to brighten our days!
Rhonda is a self-taught artist who takes ordinary materials and creates extraordinary things. To create Chantilly, she started with a trash bag filled with recycled newspapers. Cardboard was used where needed. Add papier mâché, hundreds and hundreds of scales made from damaged print items, glue, spray paint and a lot of imagination and Chantilly emerges. Rhonda doesn’t use patterns but rather draws inspiration from the illustrations in children’s picture books. Schmaws the Shark sits above the library’s Hold Shelf. Needless to say, Schmaws’ mask is a favorite with all ages.
In 2019, Rhonda created a family of musical instruments from cardboard.
A lion with a mouse in planned for the 2021 Summer Reading Program, which will feature a “Tails and Tales” theme.
The library system is following public health directives issued by the Governor and our Mayor. Check the library’s website for updated hours and contact information.
If possible, the library system soon will be opening the Ernie Pyle Library, though only 1 person may enter at a time. Additionally, plans are being made to add a 6th day of service at the Main Library. Computer service will be added at the East Mountain Library, the Rudolfo Anaya North Valley Library, the Taylor Ranch Library and the South Broadway Library.
For customer safety, all returned materials are held for 72 hours before being made available for checkout.
The Friends of the Library have multiple options for you to purchase holiday gifts.
On October 24 Modern Albuquerque presented A New Modernist Landmark: Virtual Tour of the Albuquerque Main Public Library. Click here to view it.
Our Main Library is listed on the National Register of Historic Places and was designated a City Landmark in August 2020.
PLEASE VOTE TO SUPPORT YOUR LIBRARY!
The Library Advisory Board is working hard to inform residents about the upcoming election that includes two bond issues critical to keeping our library collections up to date. Learn more about the bond issues and Library Advisory Board.
In addition, the print version of the 2020 General Election Voter Guide from the League of Women Voters of Central NM (Bernalillo, Sandoval, Torrance, Valencia Counties) should be available by October 6 when early voting begins. Look for it at libraries, community centers, stores and some businesses.
In the meantime, the League invites you to explore the online version of the Voter Guide. Simply type in your address and you’ll read all about the candidates and ballot questions you will see on your ballot when you vote.
Programming during a pandemic? As all of you know, there are numerous virtual program links on the library’s website: https://www.youtube.com/user/TheABCLibrary. However, the staff at the Central & Unser Library took it one step further!
In January of 2020 the Central & Unser Library started a program featuring teen artwork in the Freedman Young Adult room. This now has turned into an ongoing and very successful passive program that to date has featured 10 different artworks by young community artists.
The Young Adult room has a floor to ceiling whiteboard that was underutilized. Staff member Karina Todechine identified the opportunity to bring in young artists and liven up both the YA Room and the entrance to the library. With a step stool handy, participating teen artists now have a blank canvas that goes from floor to ceiling. One artist is featured each month.
The artwork brightens the Young Adult room and is visible to all as they enter the Library. Teen artists also have opportunity to showcase their creativity in a safe and welcoming space. Passive programming at its best!
Clone Trooper
by Jose
Kindness and Hope
by Kaylee
Lion King
by Xochitl
Balloon Fiesta
by Zoe
The Friends of the Public Library are back in business!
The Bookshop on the lower floor of the Main Library is open from 11am to 3 pm, Monday through Friday. The Main Library Book Sales will take place on Tuesdays and Fridays from 11am to 3 pm.
Now, more than ever, The Public Library is needed as a trusted source of information. The ABQ City Council is expected to finalize our Cityʼs 2021 budget in October. We are still operating with the 2020 budget.
Your personal support is needed.
Contact your City Council Representative and let them know how important The Public Library is to YOU and YOUR FAMILY.
This is a perfect opportunity for letter-writing or picture-drawing for your kids and grandkids. The Library belongs to all of us and all voices need to be heard.
The Public Library has always been "there" for us. Letʼs keep it that way. Please drop a note now to your City Council Representative. And thanks!
Save the Date: October 2, 2020, 5:00pm
From the author of H is for Hawk, Helen Macdonald reads from her new book, Vesper Flights, for Bookworksʼ A Word with Writers literary fundraiser for the Albuquerque Public Library Foundation.
Each ticket includes a book and a donation to the library foundation.
To obtain the Zoom event link for the event, buy your ticket HERE!
Effective September 8 2020, the Friends of the Library Bookshop at the Main Library will be open 11 to 3 Monday through Friday. Occupancy will be limited to 4. Book Sales will be held on Tuesdays and Fridays from 11 to 3 and occupancy is limited to 16. For more information, call the Main Library Information Desk: 768-5141.
Hours will be expanding throughout the library system in September. The library’s webpage will have current information.
Programs for adults and children alike are an essential service at our Albuquerque and Bernalillo County libraries. As we all learn to cope with lifesaving precautions during this pandemic, the library staff have been busy preparing videos of programs on a variety of subjects. Check them out on the library system’s YouTube channel.
Having trouble downloading a digital book or digital audiobook? Call your branch and the staff will help you over the phone.
Need help? Please don’t hesitate to ask library staff for assistance. In an effort to maintain a safe environment for all, library customers are encouraged to limit each visit to 15 minutes. However, if you want to browse a bit, that can be seem like too short a time.
Looking for a good mystery? Does your preschooler want picture books on trucks or dinosaurs? Need a new cookbook? Call ahead and tell the staff what you are looking for and they will put some items aside for you. The staff is ready to help you and to keep everyone safe!
Last but not least, the library system has a new page on the website called “What Do You Want to Learn?” This page groups resources by subject and includes an “Ask Us” portal. Check it out: https://abqlibrary.org/whatdoyouwanttolearn.
Excavation work is underway at the site of the International District Library.
by Lance Chilton
Libraries in Albuquerque reopened in part in May, with altered hours and social distancing carefully designed to allow them to provide many services to patrons while keeping them and library staff safe. Fifteen of the 18 branches are regularly open; one, Special Collections is available by appointment, Ernie Pyle is too small for appropriate social distancing, and the Alamosa Library is being used temporarily for other purposes.
I asked two librarian administrators, Mary Sue Houser and Debbi Hassi, to comment on what is going on during this strange and unprecedented time. Ms. Houser noted that while in-person visitation is considerably below normal levels, use of digital resources is booming. While inperson programming cannot be done, the libraries have programs on-line, both from the AMP performers who would be in the branches and also from the state library. Check them out at https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCaRswP_3fQ6bNjEDQPzGQ3A and https://www.facebook.com/ABCLibrary/.
“We know how important the library computers are to many of our patrons,” Ms. Houser said, staffng library staff are sorry that use of library computers is unsafe and thus unavailable during times of COVID-19. However, she pointed to the availability of librarians to answer questions over the phone, expanded wifi access in many parts of the city, and extensive databases that can find anything from a child’s name to a business’s address. “Librarians love customers, so we miss engaging with customers and offering programming,” she said, but we’re finding other ways to be effective.”
Deborah Hassi, director of children’s services at the libraries, wrote, “I can tell you that despite the alternative nature of this year’s Summer Reading Program, we still have quite a few young people participating; over 1,500 under 18 years old are signed up, and a couple hundred of those have already completed their reading goals. We’ve also been handing out reading logs and free books at select City of Albuquerque lunch distribution sites. The site I visited a couple of times was well-attended, and everyone was pleasantly surprised to get goodies from the Public Library as well as good things for their tummies.”
Albuquerque’s public libraries continue to play a vital role in our community’s affairs, even in an only partially opened state. As the state is able to open further, the libraries will do so also.
By Lance Chilton
Samantha Meyer Gallegos, our most recent board member, has libraries in her blood. She talks of visiting libraries often when she was small, accompanied by her grandmother, a children’s librarian who worked in a number of elementary schools in Philadelphia as well as in Albuquerque’s Alameda Elementary School, or her mother, a reference librarian who worked at Sandia High School.
A long-time Albuquerque resident after finishing college at the University of Washington, Samantha and her husband, Rojerio (Roger) Gallegos, run a digital marketing firm from the house they share with their busy three-year old daughter, except on the day each week when a grandmother enjoys her company. You can see their lovely web design at their own website. Samantha is becoming the social media guru for the APLF Board, given her strong knowledge of marketing and the use of social platforms.
Samantha has a strong belief in the importance of reading, both for later success in school and for emotional development. She credits an “incredible library experience” at Georgia O’Keefe Elementary School for strengthening the love of reading brought about by her own parents. Books, she says, help us “learn about the world in a gentle, effective and engaging way.“
The family uses the Cherry Hills Library, where they frequently can be seen leaving with a “great pile of books” for the adults and the child alike. Samantha’s daughter sleeps with books, holding on to her favorites through the night, including Lulu Is a Rhinoceros and Jo Allan’s series about Hettie the Highland Cow. Aside from using actual books on paper, Samantha also accesses library databases, eBooks audiobooks, and magazines in digital format. Samantha is a successful free-lance writer and has experience with blogs as well as print publications. She currently is working on a children’s book.
Not so very long ago, Samantha took her dog to veterinarian and APLF Board Member John Heidrich. Knowing of her interest in reading, Dr. Heidrich asked if she might want to be on the Board as well. And the rest, as they say, is history.
Rojerio Gallegos has written online, “I am an incredibly lucky husband to a beautiful, smart, and strong woman.” The APLF Board is incredibly fortunate to have Samantha Meyer Gallegos as a valued member.
The Albuquerque Public Library Foundation notes with sadness the death of renowned New Mexico author, Rudolfo Anaya. Mr. Anaya will live on in our hearts, in the North Valley library named for him, in the early literacy program he founded in Rio Arriba County, and in his many books, including all-time favorite Bless Me Ultima.
By Lance Chilton
“We are here today to announce a very special groundbreaking. It’s special for a number of reasons – because of corona, we can’t do it the way we normally would do, but we’re doing it to celebrate the groundbreaking of a new library at the site of the old Caravan East, in the heart of the International District.“ With these words, spoken on May 21, Mayor Tim Keller leads off one of two videos you can see on the city’s Facebook page, showing city and state leaders, community activists, and Albuquerque Public Library Foundation board members turn symbolic shovels of sandy earth as construction starts on the new library, which will be the city’s nineteenth. An architect's rendering of the completed library is pictured above.
There were many excellent speakers, socially distanced, one by one in front of the sculptural blue door. The most lyrical was our city’s poet laureate, Michelle Otero, who gave us permission to reproduce the poem she had written for the event, Breaking Ground.
Caravan East sign says, Breathe
in this moment. We break
ground in this place where we
cumbia’d to Al Hurricane,
two-stepped to Glen Campbell. Breathe in
this moment, when we stand together
by standing apart, holding our touch
for another time. We break ground
in this place of ghosts, strong souls
spiriting us across oceans, whispering
stories in wind. This ground
of sawdust-covered floors. This ground—
alluvial plain off Sandias, where roots
of corn, bean, squash compact under asphalt, converge
on Route 66—journey’s beginning or end
or just passing through. We break ground
to say, Stay with me. Sit. Tell your story.
Journeys across states, over continents,
through cloud and ocean se encuentran
aquí en la mesa made of books. We breathe
in this moment, break ground,
break bread—
phô and fufu, fry bread, fideo
ashak and arroz con pollo.
In this moment, we stand together
by standing apart. My mask is
your shield. Your mask is mine.
It won’t always be this way.
We break ground to grow
something new, build from seeds
planted before we were born.
We water shoots pushing through concrete.
We are geranium in a coffee can, all colors
of sunrise over Sandias, welcoming
us home.
--Michelle Otero©2020
The wonderful videos, the next best thing to having been able to be there, are at https://www.facebook.com/ABCLibrary/videos/915744752206356 and https://www.facebook.com/180969928599357/posts/3413639248665726/. This second video is also at https://youtu.be/RcfXrju9b6w.
The 50th Earth Day fell on April 22 of this year; carbon emissions were down thanks to the economic contraction that day and the climate breathed a sigh of relief, even as we were confined to quarters for the 42nd day of New Mexico’s coronavirus pandemic restrictions. All of us had to celebrate Earth Day in our own way, and our Albuquerque Public Library celebrated with a virtual salad made of its own lettuce and kale and basil, grown in its demonstration tower gardens at the Main, Central/Unser, and South Broadway libraries. Tower gardens use a relatively new and highly environmentally sound means of small-scale agriculture called aeroponic gardening. You can read more about it on the website of the All of Us project on the library’s website.
By Lance Chilton
How is the shuttered Albuquerque Public Library doing in this strange time? I spoke with Library Director Dean P. Smith by Zoom on the 49th day of closure.
"In this unprecedented time, library staff continue their mission of bringing resources and services to our community through our varied online services and collections," Mr. Smith said. "Though our buildings are closed, our online resources are available to city and county residents 24 hours a day, 7 days a week."
The richness of the library’s on-line services is astounding and available to anyone with a library card, whether or not there’s a pandemic raging outside, and whether or not the front doors of any branch are open. Mr. Smith notes that many people, confined at home during the pandemic, have been discovering just that, and many are signing up for library cards for the first time so they can use those resources. Potential users must have a computer, tablet or smart phone, but even wifi is available at multiple sites throughout Albuquerque, including the parking lots of many of the libraries. Click here for an updated map and list of those locations.
What can you get online from our libraries? Almost anything except traditional books on paper. Music, movies, audio-books, e-books, amazing data bases full of information, hints as to what to do with your home-bound kids to keep them occupied… the list goes on. Mr. Smith highlighted a few of the services available as among his favorites:
All of us hope that the libraries will be opening again soon, but we know neither when that will occur nor exactly what services will be available when they do open. Mr. Smith emphasized the paramount importance of maintaining the safety of library users and staff. Masks and other personal protective equipment will be necessary for both groups. The use of public-access computers is especially problematic, Mr. Smith noted. Computers are grouped in most branches, making physical distancing difficult.
Mr. Smith noted that the pandemic has been very frustrating to public librarians everywhere. “We look upon a library as a place for people to get together and work in one place, whether they interact with one another or not,” he said, “but right now we’re doing what we need to be doing.”
During Mayor Tim Keller’s telephonic town hall on Monday, April 27, the mayor spotlighted the “wonderful International District Library” as evidence that the city is progressing despite the pandemic. Though there can’t be a gala public event to highlight the groundbreaking for the library on East Central between Charleston and San Pedro, a smaller commemoration of the start of construction sometime in May will be covered by the media – watch for it!
Suzanne Apodaca and her daughter used the Juan Tabo Library for many of Suzanne’s 30 years in Albuquerque; she and her now four-year old grandson, Cole, who is pictured at right, have visited the Cherry Hills Library weekly until it closed recently during the virus. One of the little boy’s proudest possessions is his library card.
For love of books and libraries and a desire to support them, Suzanne joined our Albuquerque Public Library Foundation board nearly a year ago and has since been doing a yeoperson’s job as APLF treasurer ever since.
Suzanne came to the board after retiring in 2018 from a highly successful real estate career that she has since passed on to her stepdaughter. Prior to that she had been bookkeeper for a family construction business and for New Mexico Special Olympics, skills that translate well into keeping careful track of the APLF finances. Suzanne enjoys helping people; she has for several years volunteered to help senior citizens with their annual tax returns.
Suzanne loves to read, favoring spiritual books and fiction, especially fiction telling a family story such as the books of Maeve Binchy, and cites Rosamunde Pilcher’s The Shell Seekers as her favorite book of all time.
When not reading or attending to APLF financial matters, Suzanne walks three or four miles a day and cooks plant-based meals for herself and more omnivorous fare for her husband.
Suzanne Apodaca is a great addition to the APLF Board; we’re all very happy to have her and her skills alongside us.
April 19 – 25, 2020
This is a time for us to be thankful for the outstanding library system that we have in Albuquerque and Bernalillo County. To show your appreciation, you could do one of the following:
By Lance Chilton
As I write this, I was last in an Albuquerque library yesterday. I won’t be in one again for the next month. As all of you reading this know, the Albuquerque-Bernalillo County Libraries have been shuttered until at least April 15 due to our new enemy, the coronavirus, COVID-19. And of course not only libraries are closed.
I stopped by the busy Erna Fergusson library on San Mateo to while away some time between appointments. I found the book I wanted on the shelf and read away – a novel by Louise Erdrich, since we all were unable to see her in person on March 12, again due to the same enemy. A great many people were in the library – the helpful librarians, of course, people of all ages browsing the stacks, many working on computers, some reading magazines or books like me, some dozing. I felt right at home.
My mother was one of those who depended on the computers in her local library in a small town in California – the library was her second home; her first one had no computer. If she were here in Albuquerque right now, she’d be deprived of access to her email and much of her connection with the world, let alone the books she read night and day. I have a computer at home, but many Albuquerqueans do not, and depend on their library computer time for email, news, job applications, and much else. The books in print and the computers aren’t available right now, in the interest of our health.
But all is not lost: a great deal of remarkable material is available with your library card even when the library is closed. Many books are available to be downloaded, perfect to be read on your electronic device (computer, smart phone, tablet, or e-reader). Many audio books are ready to be checked out and downloaded electronically. The library’s startlingly good set of electronic databases and other eResources are just as available as before the COVID-19 invaded the country and the city. Your new best friend may be abqlibrary.org.
We’ll all be happy to bid the coronavirus farewell. We’ll all be glad to see our essential libraries open again, and life can resume much as it was before. In the meanwhile, the library has our backs.
One of the many events cancelled due to COVID-19 was the eagerly-awaited in-person interview with Louise Erdrich, a very-inventive author of some 16 novels, including the one she was to have read from on the stage of the KiMo Theater to a sold-out crowd. Having just completed the previous Erdrich novel, Future Home of the Living God, I was anxious to get started on the new one, The Night Watchman.
So I hoped to go to Bookworks, but found that it unfortunately has been forced to suspend most of its services during the emergency. If you had tickets to the Louise Erdrich event, you’ll be able to pick up your copy of The Night Watchman after Bookworks reopens. You can still order books through Bookworks' website, and they will be mailed to you free of shipping charges through the end of March. Bookworks hopes to be able to reschedule Ms. Erdrich's event when the dust (and the virus) settle.
The Albuquerque Public Library Foundation is encouraging our library supporters to recognize a friend or family member with a donation to the Foundation. Give a donation in memory of a loved one or in honor of someone you admire and they or their family will receive a personal note from us letting them know about your generous gift.
Click here to donate. Follow the directions to donate online or to donate by mail. Be sure to include contact information about the designee of the gift so that the Library Foundation can let that person know of your gift—without mentioning the amount. Or if it is a memorial, please let us know the person you want notified.
Your donation and designee will be listed our website to recognize your thoughtfulness and your willingness to support the library system. Gifts honoring the milestones in the lives of your loved ones will enable the libraries to offer more programs and services benefitting Albuquerque and Bernalillo County residents of all ages.
From the Oxford Dictionary definition of trailer:
An excerpt or series of excerpts from a movie or program [OR BOOK] used to advertise it in advance; a preview.
Just this past weekend, your public library held its award ceremony for a group of very talented teens and pre-teens who had made their own book trailers. Sometimes video images and books seem to be in competition for our time, but in this case, the video promotes the book. From the library’s website, “Book Trailers are made to encourage people to read a particular book or novel. They usually give an audience a sense of what a book is about without giving away too many details so the audience will want to read the book to find out what happens.”
I spoke with members of a family that put together one of the prize-winning trailers for last year’s contest – Far from the Tree – “by JEML Productions.” JEML is the Larrañaga family of four siblings, Iliana, Lorena, Marisa and Mateo, not separated at birth unlike the heroes of the book. I spoke with two of the Larrañaga sisters. Iliana said that she and her siblings enjoyed doing videos and projects together and especially about a book that she loved. Lorena said that she and her sisters and brother enjoyed the team effort on a great book representing time long ago.
You’re now among the first to know that the March 2020 winners of the teen trailer awards (drum roll please):
On the same website, https://abqlibrary.org/booktrailercontest, you can watch the wonderful trailers that have won the contest in recent years. We have talented youngsters in this town, not only in the professionalism of their videos, but also in the titles and credits that entice you to check out the books and read them. Old favorites like Little Women and Of Mice and Men, genre fiction like Crimebiters and Invasion of the Underworld, and children’s classics like Green Eggs and Ham and Charlotte’s Web are all there.
The contest is sponsored in part by the Albuquerque Public Library Foundation which is delighted that scores of youth entered this year’s Book Trailer contest, combining their skills in technology with a love for reading.
City Councilor Pat Davis remembers how important the Carnegie Library in his small Georgia hometown was. “We only had two TV channels – it was the news, Sesame Street, or a book,” he said during a recent interview. He still loves to read, though more often now he has to read legislation and budget reports.
Councilor Davis recently happily announced that groundbreaking for the new International District Library will occur sometime this spring. “It will be a major event,” he said, with one hundred shovels.” He thought the community had waited long enough; planning has been ten years in the making.
Although there are two libraries in Mr. Davis’ district, both are “bursting at the seams,” as he said. The Ernie Pyle Library is fun to visit and homey – but that’s just what it is, a home, and can’t house more than half a dozen people at a time. The San Pedro Library is considerably larger. Like Ernie Pyle, it is filled with helpful librarians, but there is only so much that can be done with very little space, and no meeting rooms.
Councilor Davis referred forcefully to the need for more room for community groups to meet. In his highly diverse district, Council District 6, some 27 languages are spoken. Some families have all the resources they need for fostering early literacy; many do not.
Councilor Davis believes that the International District Library will be a great place for meetings and for displays of cultural objects. He stated that he looked forward to community members coming in to the new library for a meeting or a look at cultural artifacts and then finding all the book and computer and online services that are offered there.
A member of City Council for the past four years and recently re-elected, Mr. Davis relayed an anecdote of his dependence on Albuquerque’s libraries. Wanting to be sworn in with his hand on the US Constitution, he had difficulty finding a copy anywhere in City Hall – everything was online and you can’t (yet) be sworn in on a computer terminal. Finally, a printed copy of the Constitution was found in the reference section of the Main Library, and since it was not to be checked out, it was escorted over to City Hall for the ceremony. It then was returned to its place in the reference stacks, where it, like all the libraries’ great resources, is available to everyone.
Starting almost two years ago, our Albuquerque Bernalillo County Public Library began issuing cards to every third grader in APS schools, starting with one school, proving it worked, and then moving on and on and on as fast as library staff could make the cards. Those already having cards were given a “novelty” card, which is imprinted with each student’s name and a message congratulating them on already having a card. Everyone else got a bright new card and was encouraged to use them at any library in the system.
So far, according to Deborah Hassi, Youth Services Manager, 6,682 children have received a card, roughly 60 per cent of them new to the library system. Librarians emphasize that the services are free, and cards are available at any of the ABC Library’s 18 locations.
What was your favorite book, as a child? Among favorites of grandparent age now, books like In a Night Kitchen, Goodnight Moon, Winnie the Pooh, The Cat in the Hat, and Charlotte’s Web are often mentioned. Our children wanted to hear Thy Friend, Obadiah and Alexander and The Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day over and over and over. Older children may read Harry Potter over and over.
The point is to read with a child, whatever book is chosen.. Early exposure to books – and to words! – is important for school readiness – lots of educational and medical evidence supports this.
Our Albuquerque libraries do a great job of supporting early literacy in many ways, including (but not limited to) having outstanding collections of kids’ books for all ages. Story times, participation in the program “Every Child Ready to Read” and Read to the Dogs programs are complemented by Early Literacy Centers, with checkout-able Early Literacy kits in eleven of the branches of the Albuquerque Public Library.
Early literacy centers and early literacy kits are projects of the Albuquerque Public Library Foundation, with a major assist from TLC Plumbing. Your donations (and companies’ and board members’ gifts to APLF) help to establish, equip, and maintain these centers, so important to starting kids off in the right direction on reading.
According to NAEP data provided by Thomas Scharmen, MPH, of the New Mexico Department of Health, in many Albuquerque schools, only a very small proportion of fourth graders can be rated “proficient” at reading. There are many elementaries where fewer than 15% are rated “proficient,” and almost none where more than 40% are “proficient.” Clearly we need Early Literacy Centers, and APLF would like to thank its donors for supporting them.
For more information, go to The NAEP Reading Achievement Levels by Grade web page for information on criteria and measurement of proficiency, to Understanding Assessment Results for a pediatric view as to the importance of early literacy to child health and well-being.
Click here for a terrific list of what the New York Public Library considers “100 Great Children’s Books.”. Three all-time favorites from that list are shown below.
And go to our library’s website, for information about story times, early literacy centers, and other ways in which the Albuquerque-Bernalillo County Libraries support early reading and literacy.
PO Box 25792, Albuquerque, NM 87125
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