Welcome Back!

Yay for 3 day weekends! A time to relax...and after the first weeks of school reflect. At the beginning of the school year, I wrote about my Summer (you can find it here) and all of my moves.

Being the new man on campus, I am all about relationships (okay.. I lie.. I am actually ALWAYS working on relationships.. I like to be involved and I like to make sure others know that I appreciate them!)


The first thing I needed to do was orientation for students.  I am following in the footsteps of one amazing librarian! I searched for ways that I could introduce myself and the ideas I had for the library and came across Andy Plemmons blog.  It was EXACTLY what I was looking for.  I know that when I go to the library, I always go to the same spot. I loved his idea of setting up chairs all over the library to have students look at something different than where they might normally go.

Orientation.  I used a very basic Google Slides full of bitmojis (which I am slightly addicted to right now) and used Andy Plemmons idea of a first lines and introduced myself and the library.

Overall it went well.  After students came back from looking at books I asked them if they found any books that might interest them.  I of course had ones that said no.. and I promptly replied back.. That is great! Thank you for being honest, and that just means I want to chat with you about you might like.

The first day of school I also passed out handmade bookmarks.

 Things that I heard from middle schoolers in the first 2 weeks of school:

I look like the first Spiderman

I look like Ellen Degeneres 

Another student told this administrator she looked like me!

#collegcolorsday #irving2college #iisdlamra

I have been sharing all of my Middle School Librarian stories on my Beeinthebookends account (I even have a ghost in the library!!)

Things coming up:
-iPad rollout.. We are a VILS campus I can't WAIT to integrate even more into the library!
-Dot Day! Yes, I am still doing Dot Day- I am just modifying it a bit for middle school
-Banned Books week (the conversations that I get to have with middle schoolers is awesome!)
-Global Read Aloud
-the start of book clubs
-the start of the ukulele club! Yes! They came with me!

I have missed my elementary peeps, but oh my goodness.. the fun I have already had in Middle School has been wonderful! It has been great because I have already had so many people welcome me in.  The one thing that I need to catch up on.. BOOKS.  I know lots of picture book authors, so I am trying to quickly get caught up on YA books. SO much to learn!

If you love Bitmojis as much as I do, check out this blog by the Daring Librarian

There are SO many people that have helped me find my way in this new library.. but this woman right here answers at least 5000000 questions I have a day! Thanks Mrs. Gomez for being so supportive and still smiling when I ask you that one more question!







My word this year is perspective.  Change is hard, but I am SO glad that I changed my perspective and tried something new! I am only 2 weeks in.. and I can't WAIT to see what we do in the library this year!