Welcome!

Welcome to my blog! As the title of this blog indicates, I am the Happy (future) Children's Librarian. I am happy because I now know the tools for success that children need to succeed. Here are the things that you will find in this blog:

A list of books for babies, younger preschoolers, older preschoolers, and younger elementary children.

Each of the books has its own entry and includes the following information:

• The title and author of the book.
• A brief summary to help you know what it is about.
• A discussion question to help start a conversation between you and the child in your care. These discussion questions are meant as a starting point to encourage conversation. You and your child will also come up with great topics to talk about!
• Tags to help you find similar items. At the bottom of the blog post or on the sidebar, if you click on a label, you will be taken to a page that has books or play activities on a similar subject (dogs or caterpillars for example) or level (lower preschool or babies for example).

On this blog you will also find fingerplays, rhymes and songs that are labeled as "play." Play is an important part of a child's development. These fingerplays, rhymes and songs are classic and are from the following books:

• Hand Rhymes Collected and Illustrated by Marc Brown
• Dan Yaccarino's Mother Goose
• Head, Shoulders, Knees, and Toes by Zita Newcome (includes illustrations of fingerplays)
• Singing with Young Children by Bonnie Phipps

I have also compiled a list of activities that can be done with children. These activities come from:

• Peggy Kaye's website
• Variations on creative writing prompts
• My brain!
  

The more we talk to children, the better. There are six key skills that help children learn to read later on: print motivation, vocabulary, print awareness, narrative skills, letter knowledge, and phonological awareness. Hearing, seeing, speaking and making words are important to go through before children read. For parents and caregivers this means:

• Talk a lot to your child.
• Encourage children to talk a lot
• Take turns during conversation
• Use complex language
• Give full explanations to questions
• Ask questions of your own
• Read books every day
• Let your child see you reading
• Help children learn a second language early on
• Seek out resources for language exposure (like the library!)

All adults can conduct true conversation, which means listening with sincere interest, responding to enhance and continue conversation, and giving children time to formulate answers and then waiting for replies. Slow down and listen please! Give children something to talk about. Encourage conversation between children. Ask open-ended questions.

Play, interact, talk to, and read to the child in your care, please! This will help with their development more than any expensive tool might. And don't forget to take them to your local library! The librarians there will be able to help you even more. If you have any questions, please feel free to email me at mwilker2@emporia.edu!