Teen Transliteracy Summer Reading Part 2

Here is a link to the Teen Transliteracy Summer Reading Program Quest Book I created for the 2012 season.

All in all I am really disappointed. Let me preface that with I had really good program attendance but only had 5 teens of the 30 something who registered actually turn in their quest book at the end of the program. All summer long there were more teens who completed quests that I signed-off on but they failed to turn in their book so I could count up how many quests they finished thus awarding them raffle tickets.

Where did I go wrong?
In previous years they write down what they read in a home log book. Each item has a point value, 1 point=1 raffle ticket. They also have an official reading log that stays in the library and that I would keep after the program ended. Each time the teen comes into the library they transfer the info from their home log into the in-house one. This method saw many more teens filling out the official in-house log sheet as they did not have to turn anything in to me. I think where I went wrong this year was the having them turn something in.

What will I change for next year?
For next year I plan on keeping the reading quest idea but will include many more reading tasks. Those seemed to be the most popular ones. The photography related quests also were popular. Least popular= building a solar oven to make s'mores. What?, you ask! You cannot believe those darling teens did not want to make a solar oven and bring their dear old librarian a yummy s'more. Well I am here to tell you they didn't :(
My other idea for next year is instead of having them turn in their quest book to get credit I will give them credit when they have me sign off on the quest. To do this I will add a little tear away tab at the bottom of each page in the questbook. On this little tab I will have the teen's name, the quest, and a space for my initials. Then at the end of the summer I will sort these out and award raffle tickets from these tear away tabs. No more teens having to hand anything in!

Did anyone else experiment with Transliteracy this summer?

Transliteracy in Teen Summer Reading

I recently worked with two other librarians (Chrissie Morrison of the East Greenbush Library and Kaela Wallman of the Schenectady Public Library) on a presentation of incorporating transliteracy into your teen SRP. Transliteracy is the ability to be literate across multiple forms of media (books, radio, internet, tv, etc.) This Teen SRP challanges teens to complete quests rather than following the model of just tracking books or minutes read.

Teens will complete x number of quests and for each quest they get a raffle ticket. You can chose to have the raffle at the end of the summer or raffle off one item per week. To view our presentation click here

We created quests that use the various media in and out of the library. Kaela put some of the quests we brainstormed into a little book that the teens will use to records their quests over the summer.{ Booklet } In order to keep stats make each quest equal to a number of minutes if you report minutes, or a number of books if you ocunt books. Comment on this blog post if you have more Quest ideas! I love to read the creativity of librarians!

Quests:

• Watch a movie (fiction or documentary) based on the lifeof a musician, singer or band
• Write your own ghost story (at least 1 page long
• Read a book of your choice
• Using the website http://www.bartleby.com/100write 2 quotes you like and why
• Create a piece of art (photo,drawing, collage, painting,etc)based on a dream
• Read a book with the word star in the title
• Read a book about a famous musician, actor or athlete.
• Borrow & listen to a music CD from the library.
• Borrow and read a magazine from the library
• Write your own poem or song lyrics inspired by the night sky.
• Research a famous person from your town. Write things you learned about his or her life.
• Discover 2 famous people who share your birthday. How are you and they similar or different?
• Take a picture of yourself in front of a historical marker. For extra credit use the libraryto learn more about the site you chose
• Go star gazing and identify at least 3 constellations -- bonus raffle ticket for borrowing a book about stars/constellations from the library
• Become a fan of the library on Facebook and post on our wall the title of a book you recently read and write a review of it.
• Make a video about the Teen Space in the library and let us post it to our YouTube channel
• Take a photograph at night
• Build a reflective solar cooker & experiment by cooking a marshmallow in it to make s'mores! Instructions here http://stardate.org/teachers/activities/cooker
• Find out what the night sky looked like the on the evening of the day & year you were born
• Read a book that was recommended to you by a friend or librarian
• Visit another library in our library system and borrow a book from them with your library card
• Read a book published in 2012
• Read at least 2 books from your schools recommended summer reading list
• Listen to an audiobook