Stplkids

April is poetry month. Share a poem with a friend, a family member, your pet, or a stuffed animal. Read poetry by yourself, to yourself, out loud, or in your heart. Where to start? The Poetry Foundation has a great website with access to lots of poems. They have a section just for children. You…

The Coding Craze! By Alexis Davis, Tanya DiMaggio, Jen Martin, and JoAnna Reeves Coding is a 21st century skill that can help kids be successful in school, careers, and life. Learning to code allows children to develop creative problem solving skills. Plus, it’s fun! Kids have many opportunities to learn coding at the Library. The…

The Association for Library Service to Children (ALSC) has announced their Excellence in Early Learning Digital Media Award and also the release of their annual Notable Children's Digital Media list.  The Excellence in Early Learning Digital Media Award is a new award given by ALSC. The purpose of the award is "to recognize the most distinguished digital media…

St. Tammany Parish is lucky to have a great resource in the area child safety seat fitting stations. The stations are located at Louisiana State Police Troop L, Mandeville Fire Dept., The STP Hospital Parenting Center, The Sheriff's Office in Slidell, The Slidell Fire Dept., and at Lakeview Regional Medical Center. Contact info is below…

There are some really awesome podcasts made for kids and by kids. Most of these are between 10 and 20 minutes long, which is the sweet spot for kids’ attention and also about the time it takes for most people to get to school or the grocery store.  Here are a few of my favorites…

The Louisiana Young Readers’ Choice Award is a reading enrichment program of the Louisiana Center for the Book in the State Library of Louisiana. The purpose of the program is to foster a love of reading in the children of Louisiana by motivating them to participate in the recognition of outstanding books. Students may read…

This summer has been so fun with our reading challenge theme "Libraries Rock!" Music is so important for young people for brain development, early literacy, coordination, plus plain old fun! As a play on the old game, we asked our children's librarians what their top five albums are that would be essential if they were…

Parents often ask us about the reading level of books, either generically or specifically the Lexile number or other ratings. Scholastic has a short and straightforward article that explains the different level ratings. There's always the Five Finger Rule. Choose a book that you think you will enjoy. Read the second page. Hold up a finger…