Spring Fling Workshops on Service to Spanish Speakers

California Library Association 2009 Spring Fling Workshops to feature "Breaking into Services to Latinos" and a Spanish Cataloging workshop, both on June 5th! Register at http://cla-net.org/included/docs/SpringFling_Registration.pdf

Swine Flu Information in Spanish

The following widget can be embedded in your library's site. It links to information about Swine flu in Spanish from the National Health Institute.

Guest Bloggers Wanted!!

Fellow bibliotecarios!

If you work with Spanish-speaking and Latino communities and have a piece of wisdom or news to share with the rest of the community, we would love to hear it on this blog! Guest bloggers are welcome for either one-time appearances, or ongoing, periodic contributions.

Email la bibliotecaria to become a guest blogger on Libraries, Spanish and Kids, or to let me know about your blog if you would like it linked to on Chiles.

Books for Children Grants

This information was passed on to me on the REFORMA email list, and I thought it would be valuable to repost here, even though the application deadline for this year has passed. Although these grants do not specifically relate to developing a Spanish-language collection, any money made available for collection development outside of your normal budget is a bonus, and, I hope, you might choose to use it to further your commitment to your Latino patrons.

The April 23rd deadline for applying for an April 2009 Books for
Children Grant from The Libri Foundation is fast approaching.

The Libri Foundation is a nationwide non-profit organization which
donates new, quality, hardcover children's books to small, rural public
libraries throughout the United States. Since October 1990, the
Foundation has donated over $3,600,000 worth of new children's books to
more than 2,500 libraries in 49 states, including Alaska and Hawaii.

In order to encourage and reward local support of libraries, The Libri
Foundation will match any amount of money raised by your local sponsors
from $50 to $350 on a 2-to-1 ratio. Thus, a library can receive up to
$1,050 worth of new children's books. After a library receives a grant,
local sponsors (such as formal or informal Friends groups, civic or
social organizations, local businesses, etc.) have four months, or
longer if necessary, to raise their matching funds.

The librarian of each participating library selects the books her
library will receive from a booklist provided by the Foundation. The
700-plus fiction and nonfiction titles on the booklist reflect the very
best of children's literature published primarily in the last three
years. These titles, which are for children ages 12 and under, are
award-winners or have received starred reviews in library, literary, or
education journals. The booklist also includes a selection of classic
children's titles.

Libraries are qualified on an individual basis. In general, county
libraries should serve a population under 16,000 and town libraries
should serve a population under 10,000 (usually under 5,000). Libraries
should be in a rural area, have a limited operating budget, and an
active children's department.

Please note: Rural is usually considered to be at least 30 miles from a
city with a population over 40,000. Town libraries with total operating
budgets over $150,000 and county libraries with total operating budgets
over $350,000 are rarely given grants.

Applications are accepted from independent libraries as well as
libraries which are part of a county, regional, or cooperative library
system.

A school library may apply only if it also serves as the public library
(i.e. it is open to the everyone in the community, has some summer
hours, and there is no public library in town).

A branch library may apply if the community it is in meets the
definition of rural. If the branch library receives its funding from
its parent institution, then the parent institution's total operating
budget, not just the branch library's total operating budget, must meet
the budget guidelines.

Previous BOOKS FOR CHILDREN grant recipients are eligible to apply for
another grant three years after the receipt of their last grant.
Libraries that do not fulfill all grant requirements, including the
final report, may not apply for another grant.

Application guidelines and forms may be downloaded from the Foundation's
website at: www.librifoundation.org.

For more information about The Libri Foundation or its Books for
Children program, please contact Ms. Barbara J. McKillip, President, The
Libri Foundation, PO Box 10246, Eugene, OR 97440. 541-747-9655
(phone); 541-747-4348 (fax); libri@librifoundation.org (email). Normal
office hours are: Monday-Friday, 10 a.m. to 4 p.m., Pacific Time.

Setting up a Gmail account: Video Tutorial in Spanish

More and more children these days have email accounts of their own, but, and perhaps more importantly, many of the Latino children that you serve will be bilingual, but their parents may not be. These bilingual children often serve as helpers and translators for their parents. In either case, this video tutorial in Spanish on how to set up a Gmail account could be a valuable resource to share with your Spanish-speaking patrons, children and adults alike.

Click here to see the Video Tutorial.

More Día Resources

This was posted on the REFORMA email list:

For all libraries planning to celebrate El día de los niños/El día de los libros (Día), also known as Children’s Day/Book Day. Several Día partners are currently offering a free poster or special discounts on books purchased for Día celebrations.

*Tricycle Press is offering a free poster, featuring tips and resources for celebrating Día (while supplies last).

Offering special discounts on book purchases are:

*Arte Publico Press
*Charlesbridge Publishing
*Children’s Book Press
*Cinco Puntos Press
*First Book
*Lectorum Publications, Inc.

For further information, see http://www.ala.org/dia. Then click on Partners/Sponsors.

Rare Spanish Songs go Online!

I just received this article, from the Chronicle of Higher Education, and thought I would share it. Although this collection is not aimed specifically at children, many of the songs could be fun additions to a Spanish story time or bilingual family hour. As a teacher in my previous life, I often used music as a way to connect children with different traditions and cultures. Enjoy!

http://chronicle.com/wiredcampus/article/3683/archive-watch-rare-spanish-songs-go-online

March 27, 2009

Archive Watch: Rare Spanish Songs Go Online

Over 41,000 Spanish-language songs that go back to the early 1900s were placed online this week by the Chicano Studies Center, a research unit at the University of California at Los Angeles.

The recordings are from the Arhoolie Foundation’s Strachwitz Frontera Collection of Mexican and Mexican American Recordings, the Los Angeles Times reported. It is the largest repository of Mexican and Mexican-American vernacular recordings in existence. The early works, the archives say, “is the foundation for Latino music today, since the singers and musicians who made these records helped popularize and propagate a number of traditions, including regional Mexican, Tejano, Chicano, and Mexican American music.”

If you are not physically at UCLA, however, don’t expect to hear all the music. Due to copyright restrictions, only campus computers get full access. Off-campus users can hear 50 seconds of each song, see images of the record labels, and read background information about the recording. —Josh Fischman