Library Column for May 20, 2022

@ Your Library

Summer can be a great time to explore new learning opportunities and show your kids that learning isn’t something that just happens the first eighteen years of life. The library has a variety of books to help you explore learning a new language, musical instrument or how to code just as a few of the possibilities. Can you teach an old dog new tricks? Borrow one of our books about dog training and see if you and your dog can learn together.

Do you remember hearing the poem “Paul Revere’s Midnight Ride” by Longfellow growing up, then borrow the new book Why Longfellow Lied by Jeff Lantos to learn the truth about Paul Revere and what actually happened during the American Revolution for freedom from the British. Or maybe you want to pick up some new cooking skills, then check out our cookbook collection. We have almost an entire row of cookbooks to explore.

We also have a number of online resources available anytime you get the itch to learn. Summer learning should be fun, so spend a month learning to talk like a pirate with your children using Mango languages, either online or on their app. That is just one of the almost 100 languages available through Mango.

The Arrowhead Library System subscribes to Brainfuse, an online learning platform to help kids of all ages with skills in reading, writing, mathematics, and social studies. Live tutors also available for after-school assistance. They also provide study modules for a variety of standardized tests. So if you have a motivated student, they can spend time this summer prepping for the PSAT/SAT, ACT and AP tests. Others can get valuable assistance learning new skills and keeping up with their learning over the summer. Unfortunately, not reading or doing other educational activities for the summer months can lead to up to half a school year of learning loss. It doesn’t take much each day, but a few minutes of time each day reading or doing math problems helps the brain retain what it already knows.

Another piece of Brainfuse is JobNow, an online career resource to help with resume building, job interview skills and more. I talked about this quite a bit in last week’s column, but wanted to mention it again as a great way to continue learning.

LinkedIn Learning is another resource I mentioned last week related to career building, but it also has such great creative options for learning from portrait photography to piano or keyboarding to video editing to 3D modeling and more.

Creative Bug is so cool. Learn all sorts of creative skills with online video courses and activities from daily art challenges to full length painting classes to basic sewing instruction to paperfolding. It is so fun to explore the many classes I might want to take.

Saturday, May 21 will be the last Saturday we are open until after Labor Day. Summer hours are Monday – Wednesday 10 am – 8 pm and Thursday – Friday 10 am – 6 pm.

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