All right, let's go ahead and shift on over, I'm going to get our recording started and I'm going
to welcome our presenter for today.
We're so thrilled to have Renee Grass is who comes to us from the Dakota county library in
Minnesota where she is the youth services manager.
We worked with Renee a number of years ago on a webinar, and we're happy to have her back.
I'm going to pass it over to you, and thank you so much for being here.
>> Thank you, Jennifer and thank you to WestboundJunction for having me.
I really -- webjunction for having me, and we're learning during these times, as librarians are
learning every day in our role as it is evolving.
Speaking of an ever-evolving role, talk about virtual story times and get right into it.
This is just a little bit about me.
I love story time and I love engaging with kids and families, and if you're here today, I bet you
do, too.
But I'm no story team expert, I don't know if anyone really is a story time expert.
Again, to the basis point we're always learning, I think especially as we consider ourselves early
literacy practitioners and story time facilitators, we are all growing in our story time knowledge
and trying to get better honing our craft.
And certainly all of us have had to jump-start our learning and quickly adapt to the covid-19
environment and what that means for library services.
So I really look forward to shearing and learning from you all, as well.
I am going to be sharing what we did and have done at Dakota county library, so if you haven't
followed us on Facebook yet, Dakota county library, Minnesota, that is where you will be able to
access all of our story time, our virtual story time videos.
So you will be able to see in action what I'll be talking about today from our fabulous story
time presenters.
But, first, let's go over a little bit of what we're talking about today.
I think that there is a lot to cover.
I don't think I know there is a lot to cover, so this is our road map for our conversation.
I want to stress that it is not everything.
I took a considerable amount of time trying to think about what are host to most important topics
that someone would need to know when they're really first getting started and need an introduction
into virtual story time.
And for those that have done virtual story time before, you have a lot of knowledge to share so I
really look forward to having you share that in the comments in the chat today.
I hope after this webinar, you will have a path forward to your library.
My library is not the same as your library and our libraries have different parameters and factors
and staffing capabilities, certainly, so you want to develop a program that works best for you, and
only you know what that is, you and your team.
There is a lot to cover in 90 minutes.
I will be pointing you towards additional resources in this program in this webinar, topics that I
will not be able to cover as broadly as I would like, for example, copyright and permissions I
could talk 90 minutes about that and what we've done, but you have excellent resources linked here
in this presentation.
I believe Jennifer will be including those links in the chat so you can get direct access to them.
In the end, I have a fun announcement for you ever all about virtual storytime resources.
I want to start off by getting us all connected.
As we talk about virtual storytime, it is about creating an online community I want to creates that
storytime here today why does your library want to provide virtual storytime?
What are your desired outcomes and goals?
I'll type in my why, and if you have a good understanding why you're doing something, this will
help you make decisions and have a very broad understanding of the value of that service.
So, I'm sure, as similar to ayou, Dakota county library found ourselves quickly moving towards
complete closure of our buildings, and we had to decide to stop all in-person programs and many of
our services.
We came together to talk about priorities.
We couldn't replace Everything is we had to choose.
When you make those chooses that sense of choice and setting pricers that expresses what value your
library has on what services you continue to offer.
And so, from a youth services he perspective, I knew that supporting early literacy was vital in
this time of covid to serving our communities.
We were still in the scope of school, and we wanted to connect families with young children to
early literacy opportunities sos we knew we had to adapt and put our Virtual Storytimes together.
And so, Jennifer, I'm wondering if you want to highlight a few answers that have come out in the
chat box about why other people have decided to explore this.
>> Excellent.
A flood of responses.
It's so great to see people chiming in.
Everything from staying connected to the community, ensuring some other additional access to
storytimes, especially with school closures, delivering culturally appropriate storytimes, lots of
people are talking about how the community definitely misses them and this is one way to stay
connected.
Definitely a focus on ensuring that literacy skills continue to be developed.
Lots of excellent ideas.
And reasons.
>> Wonderful.
Is I'm sure there be maybe more beyond what you've talked about and high lated there.
Those are all the excellent reasons.
That is key, as long as you understand why.
Why do we do storytime in the first place?
We help young children develop pre-reading skills and get ready for school.
Not just because it is fun.
Although all of us here today know that storytime is fun, but there is a larger purpose to it.
And we always need to think about how we can translate the value and impact of what we do for our
community, especially now.
Especially as our community is thinking, are thinking about furloughs and hiring freezes and budget
cuts.
If we can demonstrate our impact, our incredible impact to the community, this is one way we can do
it and that's through Virtual Storytime so here are some of those reasons, a lot of what you have
already highlighted, and it's beautiful to hear you all kind of touched on, to me what I've always
felt is the true role of storytime, it's connection.
And we know that all of these reasons are important.
Talking about representation in our community, we'll talk about that later with back choices.
Helping kids grow and develop in their social and emotional learning.
But connection really, we have that so much in our buildings, in person, and when we closed, we
lost that sense of connection, and I know all of us are dealing with this in our own ways on a
personal level and professional level.
But virtual story time helps connect the librarian with the kids, and in a broader sense, your
library with families and that's really part of our library's mission, especially Dakota county
library's mission, it is literally to cultivate creativity, learning and community so it is
embedded in what we do and it informed that choice of priorities of where we wanted to go.
It's what we're about.
So, when our libraries were closed, I think that's what Virtual Storytime can do, it can help to
create an online community for those that can't come in any more.
But it also has barriers, so we will talk about that, too.
So, what you need get started for Virtual Storytime?
I'm a planner, and so I'm going to say, first thing you want to do is plan, put a good plan
together and first you want to do your research.
One of the things you can do to help you develop that plan is watch things, and we have so many
libraries across the country that are putting together fantastic Virtual Storytimes.
Take the time to watch what other libraries are doing.
If you have more than one colleague at your library, who is doing Virtual Storytimes, watch your
cliques presentations and your colleague storytimes.
They're not going to be the same as yours.
You can also watch children performers and their opportunity channels.
Jim Gill who many of us love as a children's musical performer and child development specialist, he
has put together some videos and they really are quite excellent.
Laurie Werkner has her own youtube channel and our favorites in the library community and who have
been creating videos for many years already, Jbrary, looking at what many thing those wells, one of
the things do they well is connecting with the audience between those.
Two watching them in their presentation style with help you because we're all learning together.
The last thing I would recommend is watching either online or wherever you can find it, episodes of
Blues Clues, Sesame Street and Mr. Rogers Neighborhood.
The reason I recommend these three television shows is that they are trying to do what we are
intending to do with Virtual Storytime, we're trying to make a one-on-one individual connection
with children.
And I think these three classic television shows do a really good job of that.
We'll talk a little bit more about style and presentation, but there's a lot that you can glean
from these episodes.
I know myself growing up with Mr. Rogers Neighborhood and Sesame Street, I loved those shows and I
really felt I knew the people that were on Sesame Street.
I felt like Mr. Rogers was my friend and neighbor and I think a lot of that is done in the way it
was presented.
No one is going to be perfect.
No one is going to be Mr. Rogers or anybody on Sesame Street, but it is another thing you can watch
as you're planning and filling up your tool box of tools for Virtual Storytime.
So, when you're watching, here some things you want to listen for.
Notice the things that you like.
Notice the things that speak to you that you feel are impactful.
And then, also note what you don't like and think about why you don't like it or why that's not
working for you.
And, ultimately, this is for the end goal, for you to create a storytime persona of your own on
Virtual Storytime.
Some of the things that listen, also, for.
Tone, pacing, volume and audio and video quality.
And I'm speaking more about now the Virtual Storytimes at other libraries.
You want to look for flewencey in book reading, let's eye contact.
It's amazing the difference between a virtual program, a virtual storytime where the presenter has
very clear direct eye contact with the camera and one that it doesn't, and I think it make as
difference.
Structure of the program, how it is organized.
We try to present an element of warmth and that personal connection, but also logistically, how
long is the storytime.
Does it go on forever?
Do you think maybe the timing of it was just short and sweet and really effective?
Ultimately, this is going to be, you know, these are things you want to look for, especially
content.
You could get some great ideas for Virtual Storytime content as you're looking at what other
libraries are doing and also their presentation styles.
Reflect on things that you want to try, as I mention, maybe you get some great ideas for looking at
another library's Virtual Storytime.
Maybe thinking about how your style is similar or how it is different from the presenter.
And, maybe coming up in reflecting on things you want to avoid.
Asking yourself how the presenter is engaged with you as the viewer, but also thinking about how
Virtual Storytime is such a more intimate experience.
We were talking earlier, Jennifer and I about difference between an in-person presentation for a
room, a group of people in front of you and in a room, and virtual webinar like this.
And I think about how webinars are more intimate, and I'm often just more conversational in my
presentation style than if I was speaking to a room of people.
The same is true for Virtual Storytime.
You really are trying to connect with those two kids or those three, you know, those three kids
that are watching it at home or wherever they are, as opposed to playing to the crowd, which we do
in person, when we do our in-person storytimes.
Thinking about what's working and what feels a little flat to you.
You know, if there's more than one render on screen, and I've seen some storytimes that, Virtual
Storytimes, where they have more than one person interacting with each other.
Thinking about how they interact with each other.
How do they throw questions back and forth?
How is their conversation steel?
Sometimes that can be really engaging.
And there are just so many things, much more than, this I'm sure you would want to reflect on.
Okay.
So, we've done some planning, we need to keep planning because we need to choose our platform.
And, these are the three main platforms that I've seen most libraries host Virtual Storytimes.
Each one has their own pluses and minus.
Each one has their own set of barriers and ease of access.
So I want of kind break it down really quickly for you all.
Starting with Facebook, this is what Dakota county library chose as our platform, and again I want
to say all of our virtual storytimes are on our Dakota County Library Facebook page.
One of the things when we first started Virtual Storytimes is we wanted to really build an
audience.
We already had a Facebook page, we knew we wanted to draw people to it and connect them with other
content that we had on Facebook or connecting them to our website via Facebook posts.
And I think that's one of the strengths of Facebook is that you already have this embedded
community for those of you that have a Facebook page, you already have a community there, and so
anything that you push out, whether it's recorded or live video, and we'll talk about that, too, it
gets pushed out to everybody on Facebook.
There are a lot of people on Facebook.
The other piece of this is you know, when we think about advocacy and talking about the value of
impact of our work, our library keeps track of how many followers we have on social media, and
that's the only statistic we share, not how many posts or the engagement, at the end of the day, it
is the number of followers.
So if we could increase that, we knew that that was showing a more broad reach in the community,
and I will tell you, once we started Virtual Storytimes, we saw a humongous increase of followers.
But Facebook has its observe limitations, as well.
I should say one more positive to Facebook it allows you to create a play list of all of your
virtual storytimes, and actually send that play list as it can let people connect right away.
There is a feed of video record and the option of up loading recorded videos and I mentioned
connecting content to others.
Well, Facebook is not necessarily open to non-Facebook users that's one of the downsides.
You have to be a Facebook user in order to use it.
We have decided to make our video content public to all, whether you're on February or not, but
when you go on to the Facebook -- on Facebook or not, but whether you go on to the Facebook video,
from the outside, it will pop up this really aknowing window asking to you log in as a icer or seen
up.
That's not super user friendly but it does work.
The thing is, not everybody want as to use Facebook, philosophically or other, the second most pop
lay way of hosting is youtube.
Youtube's functional Citi different from how Facebook is structured.
It is a lot more separate than anything else that Facebook provides.
This decision to go with Facebook was function out of our organization and another reason you need
to pick which platform works best for you.
Our library has our own Facebook page and we monitor it ourselves.
One department in our county, and our county only has one youtube page.
Even our parks department doesn't have a surprise youtube page tomorrow give us more autonomy and
flexibility to control the content and post it we knew we had to go through Facebook because we
didn't have that here at Dakota County Library with I.T.
That as the existing structure of how our county works.
You have ability to create play lists on youtube, but if you share it out on other platforms,
sometimes it is embedded really well youtube videos don't seem to play nice or embed as seamlessly
in Facebook, so again, because the content is all created in one platform, again that was another
benefit to us for going with Facebook.
I have seen some libraries do zoom, and I just want to talk a little bit about why I think, you
know, it is something to mention today.
Zoom may requir registration, and right then and there, it is a barrier to access, I think.
You have do a lot of work on the front end to set up safety parameters so it is a safe
environment.
Some of you may have heard in the beginning of the covid-19 experience with
everybody everybody going online and experiencing zoom, some online experiences, I think the phrase
is zoom bombed, I can't remember, but unfortunate experienced happened where people who did not
have good intentions in that online community shared inappropriate content because that zoom page
was open to anybody.
Now libraries are a lot more savvy and creating certain parameters where only a person with a
unique ID number and unique log-in with active says it but you need that information somehow and
you have to have a registration process to do it.
What I like about zoom is concern see each other, especially for those people that decide to opt
into videos.
I think because of those two things it does successfully try to create an online communityism see
someone saying the idea of interacting with kids, you can do that in zoom much better than Facebook.
The only way to do that with Facebook is through the chat feature.
We will talk about that in the slide.
Zoom does offer an option to record your videos, but as far as I know, there is no option for play
list and you still have to host that recording somewhere else.
So you still need to use youtube or Facebook to host that recording.
I'm so happy and appreciative of WebJunction today, they're providing live captioning for this
webinar, and that is something I think is a positive to Zoom and youtube and Facebook.
There is some element of captioning available.
But, it's different for each one.
In zoom, you can actually assign someone to be the official captioner during your live zoom
meeting.
And, then can you provide live captioning in the moment.
You can't do that in Facebook or youtube when you're doing live.
It's really only possible if you do recordings.
So I think this is a really good transition.
You know what, I bet there is a lot of other pluses and minus to all three of those platforms, or
maybe you know of another platform that people are hosting storytimes on.
Please feel free to share that in the comments, I would love to take a look at read afterwards and
learn from you all.
But as you choose your platform, you also have to think about live verses recorded.
And, as we talk about and think about live, there are pluses and minuses to that, too.
As I mentioned, there is no live captioning feature in a live setting on Facebook.
Now, I know I said that about youtube just now, but I actually need to double check my research it,
possible there is I think there might nobody son can correct me if I'm wrong in the chat, I think
there might be a live captioning feature in youtube but I know there isn't for Facebook.
Live creates that online community as we talked earlier about the opportunity connect with
individuals in real time.
I also think there is a sense of media see when your followers see that -- of imimmediate see when
followers see Facebook has gone live, they want to tune.
In whereas, if it is up loading a video, there is not that sense of immediacy so you might not get
that sense of engagement.
When we first started our Virtual Storytimes, they were live, all of them were live.
I think the first storytime we did ever here in Dakota County Library we had about 200 live viewers
at one time.
Now we still do live but we've mixed in recording.
I think, you know, when we did do the live option, though, it provided us again with a lot of sense
of connecting with our users, and even now, miss Melanie, one of our storytimers for Dakota County
Library, she will say add your name or your child's name into the comments and I will give them a
personal shout out and say hi to them.
I think that's a great I was, a great tip for engaging with families in a live environment.
But, live can also be very unpredictable, and we've experienced that, too.
Technology can cut out or buffer or you can completely lose your live connection than does not
provide for a positive Virtual Storytime experience it also, with the live tech piece, I think that
because it is an uncontrollable environment, we have a huge issue with accessible when we think
about live environments.
I'll talk about accessibility more later, especially when we get to recorded videos.
You can control the environment more and adapt and change things so that the experience is more
positive for everybody.
I also think that, when especially for those managers on this call, or on this webinar, you know,
when you're thinking about getting staff involved with the process, not all staff are comfortable
with the idea of a live storytime.
That sense of live unpredictability may cause additional stress on staff and that is something to
really consider and not everybody, like for myself, I have a theater background, you know, talking
to you all 1516, 15, 1600 is not scary to me but we need to recognize that
live environment potentially affect the quality of our storytimers presentation just by the mere
fact it is live.
There is also no room for error.
I will say it is more time efficient, if you're just getting online and you're doing a live
storytime, it takes you time set up, time to do the program and time to take down.
But, as we think about recordings, there is a lot larger room for error, you can stop and record as
many times as you want.
And I think staff might feel it is a much less stressful environment for recording.
It also gives you a lot of opportunity for post-production.
It allows you to input those captions.
It allows you to add additional words and literacy elements that I'll talk about later into your
view youing.
Super imposing some text to really grab your viewers.
But it does take more time and you lose that sense of immediacy, which is what story sometime all
about there are pluses and minus here, too.
Feel free to share your thoughts in the chat so, as we've chosen our platform and we've talked and
decided about live verses recording, we need plan our tech.
And, you know, libraries have an evolving relationship with technology.
I think in these last three months, all of us, whether personally or professionally, have had to
become, you know, tech gurus and a lot more things than we ever thought we were going to have to
learn about.
I certainly feel that way.
I feel like video recording, editing is now part of my wheel house, and I have no problem with it.
So here are some of the things that you need to think about when you have, when you're planning for
your technology.
You're going to need some sort of voice amplification, and I mean, by that, a microphone of some
sort.
 whether it's separate, like the one that you see here, or some sort of voice amplification system
within the device that you're using to record.
You're going to need something to record your video.
Whether it is an ipad or android device or camera that has video recording capability, and you're
also going to need to provide stability to that video recorder in some sort of device tripod.
There is a whole lot of difference, unique tripods out there from the standard adjustable tripods
to tripods that can connect to your phone and like wrap around a pole so that you can record
yourself in very interesting locations.
And you're also going to need think about lighting, so not even just like where you are in your
location for filming, you're going to want to think about if there is any additional leading source
that you can provide.
So, whether it is a ring light or even a light umbrella that can help soften light, these are some
things that you might want to think about.
You're also going to need your video editing software, and that's mostly for the people who are
doing recordings, and that's true for your audio editing software, as well.
You're going to be creating large, large videos, and by large I mean in terms of the file size.
So you're going to need to come up with a solution for storing and sharing those files, so, for
example, I'm the person responsible in our library, on our social media team, and aside from
Melanie, everyone else sends me their video content and I up load it on Facebook.
And these are really large files because the quality of the video is so high, it was recorded
either on an ipad or iphone, so you might need to create, you know, a Google drive or create a
sharing process, whether it is drop pock or what have you from the people that are sharing the
video and creating the video to the person that's posting.
You do want to think about file storage.
When you're hosting a video on Facebook, that's where it lives and you may want to think about
keeping a back up copy somewhere, as well.
I want to talk a little bit about optional tech tools.
You'll see, when I talk about in the next slide our set up, it's possible where additional items
and supplies may be useful.
And, so, we have a music stand that we use to hold and prop up our books.
And we found that it works really, really well for holding and keeping stability to the book as we
can also move that music stand closer and further away from the screen.
Miss Melanie uses her music stand to put and show the lyrics to the songs in very, very large type
so it can hold things, too.
Another thing that you can use instead of that is a book display holder.
So we've been trying to get really creative.
Again it might be because I have a theater background and Melanie does, too, where we thought about
the music stand, but it's proven really useful because it can hold a really long picture book and
keep it stable, like I mentioned.
If you're going to incorporate music in your storytime, and not just singing it, you will probably
want to invest in a bluetooth speaker for your device.
If you're playing on a CD player, test that in advance to make sure the audio quality is good and
it is loud enough and close enough to your video recording device so that people in the video can
hear it.
But, I found that bluetooth speakers are really great because you can put it right next to the
device that you're recording and you can press play using the remote wherever you are in the
filming area, you can just press play in the remote control.
The other piece is the actual remote control, you may want to invest in a remote control for
starting and stopping your recording.
I don't necessarily think that's needed, really, but you could.
You know, when Melanie and I and Ann first started our Virtual Storytimes and they were live, we
had a sign on the music stand that said, Virtual Storytime in five minutes.
And then, when we were ready to go live, we lifted the sign up and we said, you know, Virtual
Storytime starting now and we moved it off the screen and we just sat down.
So the fact that you have some sort of visual there gives you a little time, we always went live a
little early so that gave people time to connect in.
Anyway, we worked around the bluetooth remote control issue.
As we transition to thinking about lighting, I mentioned the ring light or reflective umbrella.
If your lighting situation is really challenging, there is nothing you can do around you, like
whether it is lighting from above or your location is just, like I said, that challenging, these
can be additional tools to help you control the lighting in more positive ways.
you know, I wrote down introduction slide with logo and some of our more recent storytimes, Virtual
Storytimes, incorporate a slide of our logo to present it in a more professional style-looking way,
and these are just our recorded videos.
So this is another animation or edit that you can incorporate into your videos, if you have the
time, if you have the interest.
And it is possible you may need adapters to connect.
We found early on our recording device, which was an ipad, was not compatible with our microphone
at the time so we needed a lightning cable to make sure it was compatible.
So as you're planning the tech, really making sure you test everything so that everything works
together.
So this is literally my home.
This is my set up for storytime, and I mentioned that we started with Facebook live and I did
Facebook live pretty much the whole way through until I transitioned into our summer discovery
program.
But, I utilize the tripod and ipad for recording pause I found that the ipad has an extremely
good quality microphone and also very good quality video.
Video control.
Video capabilities.
I also like ipads because I had the imovie app, which allowed me to edit the video, if I did
create a recording, which I created a few recordings.
I created the -- I edited them so I could seamlessly connect the two parts of the storytime if I
needed to step away or if I made a mistake.
I am an Apple user, so I had my own personal iphone and bluetooth speaker for music.
We did have music stands, so I use that for my books.
And you can see, I mean, I really am trying to utilize like what you would on TV, like cue cards.
So I wanted to not have to look down or look away, but I also knew that I'm human and I'm going to
forget some things so I created a story team outline and I also created a couple of sheets with the
song and rhyme lyrics just as a reminder for me when I'm filming.
When I'm reading the back, I actually take the music stand from the side, I go off camera, I take
the music stand and put it on the ground.
You can't really see it very well, but there is a little piece of blue type and that's where I put
the music stand so it can get really close to the book.
And then I have a printout of the book title, author and illustrator and publisher so
I can read through when I'm introducing each book.
So I know I've seen some of the chats, I've just seen little flurry of the chats.
I'm really interested in asking you all, if you presented a virtual story team what technology tips
do you recommend?
These can be tips for actually using the technology, it can be a certain platform you like for
video and audio editing.
It could be, you know, maybe it is something like this.
So I have two tips to share with you all.
If you are an Apple user and using an ipad or iphone, keep in mind that when you get things
closer to the screen for recording, so like, for example, when I move to that book very close to
the ipad for recording, sometimes what happens with the ipad or the iphone is it will refocus.
And, it's not anything that can I control, it is just something that auto focuses so it makes sure
that it can read everything on the screen.
And that is, I mean that does detract from the quality of the video presentation.
It is like a split second of a refocus like you would in a camera, but just something to keep in
mind as you're managing stuff in front of the video camera, or in front of a recording device using
Apple products.
Another thing, and if anyone from Dakota County Library, Melanie or Ann or Debbie knows, we use
Facebook initially to go live storytime, and we created a video and we had everything set up,
everything was perfect in terms of its orientation, how far we wanted everything to be away from
the video, we tested it in our camera app on the ipad and then, when we got on to Facebook,
everything changed so know that when you go from your camera app or the Facebook live video or even
just Facebook video, Facebook does something in the actual application and reorients everything, to
the point where, when we saw this change, we had to reposition everything because it was either too
far apart or not close enough together.
And, then, when we rewatched the video from the live Facebook video, we noticed that something,
Facebook does something in post production and it pulls the video further way.
Readjusting the video again, so I'm not really sure why Facebook does that in resizing it, but it
was very frustrating because we wanted to get the video as close to the book as possible so kids
can really see it.
Just something to keep in mind, you may want to over compensate and get extra close if you're doing
Facebook live to compensate for that resizing.
So I'm sure there are a lot of other really great tips out there.
Jennifer what have you been seeing in the chat?
>> One of my favorites is to be sure to look into the camera, not at your own image.
Somebody suggests they put Googly eye stickers next to the camera lens for focus their attention on
that spot.
>> I love it, and that is such a children's librarian solution.
Googly eyes can help heal the world, I really feel that is true.
>> Lots of other great tips.
There's so many grease are great conversations going on in chat, lots of tips being shared, so
definitely know that the chat will be a resource that you can review after the session.
The other back and forth was around how the images are reversed in some situations, so just making
sure that which ever application you're using, that you have it reversed so that your audience can
see it.
>> Yes.
Those are great.
Thank you, all.
I'm really excited to see the chat after this is done.
Okay.
So we've talked tech.
Again, I want to say this is not everything.
This is 90 minutes of getting started with Virtual Storytime.
I know there's more I could talk about, but I want to keep going and talking about your actual
content.
What should you plan?
I think the eternal storytime question is, to theme or not to theme.
You know, theming can help tie together a concept really well, and you know, we have done Virtual
Storytimes at Dakota County Library about various themes.
We've done unicorns, dragons, mindfulness, yoga, we did a summer theme recently, and we also tied
it in with some days of observation.
Earth Day and for Autism Acceptance Month we did an all about autism storytime.
Those storytimes, again, are on our Virtual Storytime play list on our Dakota County Facebook
page.
We've done our beginning letter of the day themes.
This is something even our librarians do in our libraries when they do in-person programming so
that in itself is its own theme.
But having no theme gives you a little more flexibility.
We'll talk about publisher copyright and permissions later, might find it challenging to find books
all on your particular theme you want to read where the publishers have given permission for you to
read it, so that is just something to think about.
Once you have your theme, just as you would for any storytime, plan your outline.
And I'm connecting this to theater again because that's just how my brain works, but especially
because this is recorded, it's important to be intentional about the words that we use.
And I find myself and my process writing a scripting can useful.
I write scripts for this presentation right now.
I have words and freezes that I write down to have it just ready toes go, ready to say.
If it is a topic I'm not as comfortable with, I might write a detailed outline.
Here is high recommendation for preparing your program.
Yes, scripts help stay on topic.
Absolutely, I saw that one come through.
Don't forget you have the ability to plan a storytime just as you would in person, and these are
the things that you already know, so there shouldn't really be any surprises here.
You want to welcome the audience, because they're going to have probably very little context.
Maybe they've seen this video shared three, four times separately from their friends Facebook page
and they don't even know this is coming from a library.
So mention your name and mention that you're from Dakota County Library.
Introducing yourself.
Again, trying to build that rapport with your audience.
Thing is an example of universal design, because everybody likes to know what is coming next.
That's one of the reasons why we have an agenda at the top of the webinar, but some people, not
knowing what can come next, can be anxiety producing and that unpredictability is stressful.
That is the element, we are NHL that moment in time right now we cannot protect what is going to
happen in the future, so I think that is relevant to Simplet I also think about the story time
curve, and my library school at dough anyone wan University or Dr. Ferve when they were talking to
bestorytime presentations, my curve is always pretty high at the beginning, which means I have a, I
front load account longer stories, then it has a tale, depending on my audience, if it is a younger
audience, it may drop a little bit more quickly.
I always front load the stronger stories in the beginning and incorporate the movements.
I have my most engaging storytime or experience, this is not always a story, maybe it is an
activity or a song.
Then I also in writing my script, I need to think about my transitions, how are you going to close
a story.
Are you going to model clapping after a song or a story, or are you going to close with a question
or say something like, you know, that was great, thanks for reading that story with me.
Even just those transition words next, now, after are really important to continue your program.
I saw a really quick how many stories I do include, most of us include three stories.
And that's what we found keeps us at about 30 minutes for our story team.
And then, selecting your songs and activities, again, is it theme, is it not?
These are things that you need to think about, how you're going to introduce the song, how you're
going to demonstrate the song, how many times are you going to do the song.
All of the same things you would do in Bern but even more intentionally now because you're being
recorded and people can interact with you on that recording.
If you are planning questions for your audience, it is important to include some time for a
pregnant pause.
And, a pregnant pause is something that Mr. Rogers did, that Blues can be clues has done and Sesame
Street is watching and it is that time for reflection and process, processing.
Not everyone processes at the same rate and especially kids as they're growing and learning, they
process differently, so thinking about building in that time, it might seem awkward at firsts are
but the more you practice, the more I think it becomes natural.
Instead of just rushing through all of your lapping and things you're doing.
I also want to say it is really important to make sure all of our language is as inclusive as
possible.
This is true all the time but especially now that there are recordings living of our storytimes
hosted on Facebook or youtube now.
An example is instead of saying boys and girls, I all say friends or, hello, everybody.
If you're looking for a very inclusive second person fluor pronoun, I might say ya'll or you all.
I'm not frat south but I'm sure those that are incorporate that all the time.
Those are some thing is say as inclusive language, knowing that anybody of any gender can be
watching this from anywhere.
Another thing to think about why your script writing, where can you tie or could be effect people
in with the services us provide.
This is a built-in audience that you have, whether it is recorded or not, and you can promote your
summer reading program, you can talk about curb-side pick up, you can talk about tumblebooks
online, if you have a digital picture book platform where people can use, you know, anything that
you want to connect people to and promote.
This is your opportunity to do it.
And, then, always making sure you prepare your closing and sign-off.
When you watch our virtual programs or Virtual Storytimes on Dakota County can be libraries
Facebook page, you will see all of these elements together.
When we were putting together our plan for consistency and routine across our programs, these are
the things we wanted to make sure all presenters kept in mind but there was still enough
flexibility built in so everybody can bring their own style to the program.
So I want to say this.
This is true in all programs, of course.
We warrant to strive to have all of our picture book titles and selections be as diverse
representations as possible so that the books we're reading are both window, all three of these
things, windows, mirrors and leading glass doors so kid consistency themselves in the book as they
would a mirror see from others and get to know other's experiences as that he would window or maybe
it is a sliding glass door it is more of a barrier but they need that little, that little push to
be able to experience it .
And so selecting your books, these are some of the things to think about.
Number one is representation.
These are some of the things you want to think about, too, though, not every picture book is made
the same.
As I've learned really quickly with recording them, the quality and the positioning of the
illustrations and the images really make a difference when it comes to the the video qualities.
Okay, chore images, the more contrast the better and that will show up very well and be as
accessible as can be for as many people as possible.
Mat or shiny pages.
Mat is your friend when it comes to video recording.
Unfortunately, picture books have shiny pages that can cause glare depending where your source is
coming from, so that is something to think about.
This is not so much relevant in new picture books, clear or cluttered illustrations.
Can you get a sense whatever that story is trying to translate in the illustrations through the
illustrations.
Is it clear?
Does it look good on camera, essentially, is what that bullet point is about.
And, what I mean by consistent layout, is that some picture books require to you turn the page,
like, or literally turn the book up or down or side to side, depending on how the pictures are laid
out.
And that can be challenging when your camera is on a tripod and not moving at all.
So I'm really always going for a consistent layout throughout, so left to right is possible.
If there is something that you're interested, look for opportunities for voices where you can
really engage in the story and engage in the narratives.
Then, of course, thinking about your interest get age group?
What is that?
You -- your target age group.
What is that?
We want to encourage age 3 and up for stories, so stories that really match that age group, knowing
that the likelihood of younger kids watching it is probably high or siblings who are older is
probably high.
So I don't want to say broad to say that every book, it's reader, or every book is going to appeal
to everybody, that's not true.
But, really make sure that the books match your target age group.
Okay.
Another question, what do you think makes a good Virtual Storytime book?
What do you look for?
And in this case, if you have any titles, please feel free to throw them out there.
Thing question is as broad as, like, what makes a good book for storytime.
Every book has a unique storytime presentation and that's what makes storytiming so interesting is
the experiencing can so varied from person to person.
It is just as different as we are humans, so, you know, I may pick a book that you might not like,
but I may see a book that, you know, you do and you read and think, oh I could never do it like
that.
So, Jennifer, are there any tips out there for Virtual Storytimeing?
>> Yeah, lots of specific examples, actually, as well as general big text, lots of pictures,
somebody suggested though, they would read a book without pictures, as well that might be a fun way
to read.
Let's see, looks that have interactivity options.
Let's see.
Somebody mentioned that sometimes checking the book, if it visually is too shiny, that it might be
problematic, so actually testing your books, as well sounds like a good approach.
>> Definitely.
I think if you go for the recorded option, the recorded storytime option, you have the benefit of
being able to do this.
I would also say, too, that I went live on my own personal Facebook before we did our Virtual
Storytime live for the library.
I know not everybody either son Facebook and can do that or wants to do that, but I'm connected
with so many wonderful librarians online, on Facebook, I'm going to test this out and if you have
comments or suggestions, please add them into the comments, I would love to make this better for
when our library finally does go online with Facebook live.
So, yeah, let's use each other, we all are such experts in storytime already.
So thank you for sharing that.
Those are great ideas.
Okay.
Okay, we're going to get into it, nitty-gritty, copyright and permissioned.
I what was thinking what is the best way to deal with.
That people think everything we use on story sometime fair use, I agree to that to a certain extent
because it is for education purposes but I have anecdotal information another Minnesota library
when they went live early on in their Virtual Storytime career recently, they went live
with a particular book, that was not given the appropriate permissions that publisher contacted
them.
So, the thing is, we're in a really, talk about unpredictable environment, that's just what we
are.
A lot of publishers gave her mission for their use of their -- permission for the use of their
materials to support distance learning, to support teachers teaching students at home.
Every publisher decided to do something different.
When it comes to copyright and permission I should stay on my script and say your organization is
ultimately the responsible party for what virtual content you post online.
This includes books, songs and rhymes.
And the nice thing is we do have guidance from the association of library services to children, and
school library journal, who have provided information and guidance encor on on copyright.
I may read something that American libraries puts out about copyright and permission, and the next
day hear another storyI hear about a publisher saying take down my material.
You need to do your research.
Whether it is you personally or your manager, this is something that I took on early on and now
I've passed along the responsibility to another team member of the virtual storytime team.
You need to figure out what is appropriate, and you also need to know your organizational culture
system your library or your county extremely risk averse?
If you are, or if you don't know, ask your manager.
If you are, I would suggest following everything to the letter.
This is not the time where we need to have lawsuits to libraries, but let's go on, let's go on and
talk about this.
Okay.
So some of you may already know about this resource.
If you don't, school library journal early on became the frontrunner of supporting this
conversation for youth librarians.
Publishers started coming out with directions and parameters for how to use their materials in a
Virtual Storytime environment.
And, I started, you know, grabbing and gathering, compiling all of that myself separately and
documenting everything because I know my organization and that was going to be what my role was.
And so soon there after, I saw SLJ created a place where, on their website, they had all the
information about every, not every, but a lot of publishers, a lot of the main publishers that came
out with statements how they would support virtual learn and distance learning.
And the truth is I don't know how much longer they will allow their permissions, it is changing all
the time, but as -- because of its changing and the transition from distance learning to summer, a
lot of publishers realize, well, there is also the publish libraries we need to support.
So a lot of publishers started extending their per missions and their copy right and opening up
their copyright a little bit more to support Virtual Storytimes.
This document is the most comprehensive, compiling the information and specific criteria for each
publisher.
The truth is our beloved children's literature authors, you know, they make their money and they
are supported by their publishing company, whether right or wrong, that is true.
And so they often have to follow their publisher's lead and they can't just dictate themselves what
people can do with their material.
So, I think there are some authors that have said, you can use my material but I always want to
double check with publishers.
So that means e-mailing the publisher, double checking and asking them their advice, and asking for
their permission.
If the publisher is not listed on this list, it does not mean they won't give you permission, it
means SLJ hadn't cultivated that title or that publishing house on this direct re.
The team of Virtual Storytimeers right now, Dakota County Library, they've been doing a great job.
If they want to read a story, they will reach out to the publisher themselves.
We did a virtual story walk with a local Minnesota author and a publishing house, and the
publishing house was Harper Collins.
Even though there wases, at the time we did it, the approval for virtual storytimes was okay, this
was such a new adventure for us, a virtual story walk, we wanted to be extra sure it was okay to do
this.
I'm the type of person, if you know me, I like to plan and be thorough, you may here that fair use
is all you need and you can keep everything out online.
It has been my experience, again from the connections that I've had, that is not true and
publishers are cracking down, so why not just do the work at the front end and make sure you're
following what their guidelines are.
But, in terms of like the end date, it is really hard to say.
We don't even know how our schools will be when the new school year comes.
Okay, so the other resource that I want to connect you to is the association for library service to
children.
I've connected you to a link of an incredible chapter in a new resource, supporting virtual
programming, all about copyright considerations.
And again, because of the interest of time and we have about 20 minutes left, I'm not going to go
into more detail than to say please read this.
This has everything you need to know from definitions of what public domain is, what it is and how
it connect to resources that are in the public domain to what copyright statements mean and
recommendations about how to actually cite and, create your source or cite the publishing house
when you're doing your virtual programming.
In terms of what we do at Dakota County Library, we have the storytimers present the book title,
author, illustratesser and publishing house for every single book title at the front end and I
always put that information in the post description when we post on Facebook, too.
Again, you're learning a little bit about me, I'm very thorough, but it is also a reflection of the
environment we're in here in our county, and I think that's the best thing for us.
Other libraries are not doing that, so we also, I should say, add our songs, as well so if there
are any copyrighted songs, we cite Laurie Berkner every time, we've created Raffe, we've cited Jim
Gill.
It is also out of respect for the performer and artist so people know and can connect to their
work.
So, you may be left wanting more from that conversation, but I am going to keep going and just say
please read this document.
I have the pleasure of being a part of the team that created this not just the copyright
permissions document but please read the source it will provide you with all the guidance that you
and your team need to determine the best source positive your library.
And weapon haven't dabbled in books published internationally.
I saw a question about that.
That's just been our experience flux may be additional parameters for books published in other
countries, as well.
Other things to think about.
If your content is public domain, it is okay to use it.
Again, good definitions in that resource.
You're going to want to keep good records in case of questions.
Maybe a publishing house doesn't e-mail you right away to ask you, but maybe it's just a matter of
your community or someone adding a comment on your youtube post saying what title is that?
I would love to make that recommendation.
I would love to get that back for my family.
So it is also a matter of customer service, too, when you're sharing this information out with the
community.
Because every publishing house is different, you need to develop a plan for expiring and removing
con present your website.
Especially if they say do not host this video with this content after this date.
Ideally, identify the person that is going to take on that role.
If you're going to host virtual storytimes presented with outside vendors or by outside vendors, I
always want to make sure, with them that they have done the research and they have the permission
to present their content, whether it is songs, whether it is story, whether it is folk tales, they
are the ones responsible for that content just as they would be if they were presenting that
content in the building.
But what we found is, we've worked with some community partners that really have leaned on us for
guidance and advice on this.
One of them was a local city parks and rec who wanted to have us do and present a Virtual Storytime
in the park, and their parks person was going to walk through an additional activity and craft so
they didn't know anything about copyright and guidance, so in that case, we are the responsibility,
we are the responsible partners and we should be making sure we have the right information to
share.
And, ultimately, connect with your supervisors, connect with your senior leadership, if you need
additional guidance.
Okay.
So, I want to transition to creating literacy-rich environments.
As we talked early on this, is why one of the reasons we do storytime, so that we can encourage
kids to learn how to read and develop those skills to do that, and also to create, or to help
support kids for getting ready for school.
All of your storytimes should incorporate these five skills and practices for your storytime.
Just kind of at a bare minimum.
This is something you will want to do at any physical in-person storytime, why wouldn't to you it
online, too.
Every child ready to read.
If you don't know what this is, check it out.
It informs everything that we do in storytime.
So I'm going to give you some examples of ways that I have and some of other people have created
literacy-rich environments.
Excuse me, I apologize.
And, so, one of the things that I've done is always incorporated a bag of things and this is to
introduce the letter of the day.
Everything in my bag starts with the same letter.
And it is way for kids to connect words that they hear and letters that they eventually see with
the sounds of the words and the sounds that the word makes.
But, eventually, also learning how to connect letter recognition, as well in reading.
So, in this case, humid' presenting the letter "t account and I'm talking about a toy twins hat,
tape, toilet paper, number two and a towel, and a toothbrush.
Kids love seeing the items that come out might have bag and I usually bring it together as part of
that theme to introduce the letter "t".
This is a great resource.
A great article create dying napm dynamic Virtual Storytimes.
Some of you are willing doing this, super imposing text in your video so kids can follow along
similar to Blues Clues that way.
Clap your hands, you have the ability in the video to create that text and super impose it on your
video.
But you can kind of see even if the example, can cats see in the dark?
I might have chosen either a different color for that text or I might have chosen it to be smaller
so the t and the h were not overlapping with his dark shirt.
It is about accessible and how people are interacting with your content.
I love all these ideas, I think she has done a really great job making it interactive.
I love how engaging she is in the photos.
You can see you want to engage in the storytime.
If you don't know Ukulele storytime, she has a opportunity channel and does an incredible job in
creating virtual rich environment.
She has done Ukulele storytime to teach for librarians but also has presented a music along program
called little learners, Saint Paul public library and one of her episodes is on her youtube page.
If you take a look at it, you will see, I think, Miss Rose, as she is known, does a wonderful job
and helps support literacy for kids who follow along.
So, I'm going to throw this question out.
What ideas do you have to support early literacy do you remember Virtual Storytime?
Type your answers in the hot box below.
For the purpose of teaming, I'm going to keep going in my presentation but definitely check out the
hot back for additional ideas for incorporating early literacy in your storytime environments.
For those who know me and a little bit about my work, I have a background in --
>> Renee, it looks like we lost your audio.
I don't see that you're muted in Westboundex but you did perhaps hit a button on your head set
maybe that muted you.
Are you still there?
There we go, I hear you now.
Now it's gone.
I'm not hearing you.
I don't know if it was a setting on your head set that went out?
You might have to try, if you go to the communicate menu and under "ought Joe connection", you
might need -- "audio connection", you might need to reset your audio there.
Sorry, I know that folks are hearing me.
We were doing so good and then we lost Renee's audio we're not hearing you still.
You can switch to your person to if that works under your audio connection option.
While she is doing that, I would love to see your ideas that came through in terms of wazes that
you are supporting legal literacy, incorporating nursery rhymes, songs, finger plays.
Let's see, some other ideas.
Some more questions.
Let's see.
A bitmoje interactive storytime.
Very interesting.
Practice letter sounds and shapes, mouths for reading out loud.
Somebody asked earlier on about family storytime, and I posted a link to chat, worked with us on
super charged storytimes, shared a wonderful set of suggestions on connecting with families, using
the Virtual Storytime as a way to integrate everybody in the family into that storytime experience,
as well, alluding to some of the opportunities for caregivers to bring their early literacy
practices into every day.
>> Jennifer, can you hear me?
>> Yes, I can hear you now.
>> Wow, everybody, talk about flexibility.
Thank you for being so flexible.
I'm so sorry about that.
>> No worries, we were just reading through some of the suggestions.
>> Okay.
You know what these last three months have shown us, really, is that I think everyone is just
really flexible and understanding through technology issues.
So would you be able to pass the baton to share the content, so I can share my screen again.
Or do I still have it?
>> You still have it, so try advancing your slide.
It looks like, I see, you joined again.
Let me pass the ball to your other log-in.
>> Thank you.
>> You will have to share your, do the app share again.
>> Okay.
Thanks, everybody.
I will bet there are some really great conversations going on right now.
>> Absolutely.
A special shout out to everyone who has been posting to the youtube chat, as well.
We've been trying to integrate some of those into here, but know that chat will be a rich resource
for you to review.
All right.
>> So can you see my screen?
It should say accessibility for kids.
>> Yes.
And I believe dale is in the process of making sure that it is shared on youtube.
Yes, it looks like it is coming up on both spots.
You're all set.
>> Thank you, everyone.
We may go a little longer pause of that, but I'll try and keep time.
I realize the current situation that was completely unaccessible and causing disruptions, anything
can happen in an on experience.
These are some thing us want to look for when reviewing the quality of your video content and audio
content.
Kids with disabilities, for one thing we have captions today which is wonderful, but not all kids
tuning in to storytime know how to read, so captioning is great if you know how to read.
Do you have ASL interpretation for those kids that are still learning how to read but may be deaf
or hard of hearing, and really rely on American Sign Language as their language.
Are you allowing processing time for people with different cognition levels?
And, also bees are just different learning styles is your pacing appropriate?
When you plan your program, do you go pack and forth with your structure or do you follow along
pretty clearly.
So, again, in the interest of people, I'm going to keep going, but if you have any accessibility
tips, please feel free to share with your colleagues now I'm going to give you a couple of examples
visually what I mean when we apply this concept of accessibility for programming for Virtual
Storytime.
On the left, you might recognize this book by Todd Parr.
I think this is a great example was recommendation representation for kids seeing themselves in
books but also high-color contrast or really high-color contrast in terms of images.
It is also very large, clean, clear images that really stand out visually very well in Virtual
Storytime.
But it is also an example of maybe something that could be a little bit more accessible.
His books are not matte, they are shiny, glossy pages, so I could have gone a little bit better job
with the glare and the positioning of the book to avoid some of the glare I can see on that yellow
page.
But this is one example.
I mentioned Melanie earlier, she provides a printout for her -- she does live storytime and provide
as printedout of her songs and her rhymes, so not only is this an example of creating a
literacy-rich environment, but it also helps for those kids and individuals who can read to be able
to follow along with what is said.
We had the opportunity to partner with our Dakota County parks department and Spanish-speaking
partner in our community to provide a bilingual Spanish/English storytime, and because it was
recorded storytime, western able to go back and -- we were age to go back and actually add
captioning in post production, so this would be one example of another example of accessibility.
Facebook allows you to add captioning right in the actual Facebook platform itself in the creator
studio, which is great.
Youtube allows you to do that, also, and both allow you to up load the file, the captioning file,
to attach to the document itself.
In addition to zoom, which I already mentioned, its captioning capabilities this last photo on the
right is a picture of the visual and text schedule that I implemented in the all about autism
storytime that I did for Autism Acceptance Month.
It was not just a program about autism for kids talking about what autism is, but I really tried to
basically walk the walk and incorporate elements that were welcoming and inclue I have to kids with
you a that I mean would -- that would benefit their attending of storytime, too.
One of those was virtual schedule so this was my way of walking through that schedule with
everybody.
Okay.
So I want to give a huge shout out to all of the amazing Dakota County Library Virtual Storytime
presenters.
Each one of them has fantastic way with connecting with viewers with the, in the audience, and so I
want to say that, when it comes to finding your Virtual Storytime voice, don't do anything that
doesn't feel right or authentic to you.
I love that my picture is the one with, like, my eyes wide, but if you know me in person, that's
very authentically me.
I tend to have a very big personality.
And, let that shine through.
I don't think that we have to be fake or anything different than who we already are.
I think we can adjust our methods to be as well coming and inclusive as possible, and also
refocus on connection.
But, if you don't feel it, then your patrons aren't going to feel it.
I say that even when training storytimers who are new to storytime in person, too.
If you don't like something, it is very clear your audience will probably notice that you don't
like that something, too.
So read books that you like, sing songs that you like to sing.
You know, get engaged with the theme that you want to do a theme about the more that you can
transmit your authentic self on camera, the more your readers and listeners will follow along and
be engaged with you.
So cues, kudos to all of you DCL storytime presenters.
Engaging an audience in video is different than engaging a crowd in person, so there are a lot of
different ways you can do that.
And I think one of the ways that you can do that, we've talked about asking questions to the
audience, demonstrating or modeling to the audience.
I just want to share with you one, some really fabulous pictures of a friend of mind's kids who
engage with Miss Debbie storytime.
Davie loves trucks and things that go vroom, so whens with miss Debbie did the letter v and things
that go vrom, he really enjoyed it, you can see she has incorporated flannel pieces.
You can see how large the flannel pieces show up, even on a laptop.
As we think about the size of our manipulative's, that is another way we can really engage with the
virtual audience.
Not only looking and connecting with them in our eye contacts and movements but asking them, in
this case, asking them to point to things so it is another way of engaging.
You know, a lot of what we do in storytime is fun, of course, as we talked about in the beginning,
but it is about engagement, and so the more you can think through opportunities to engage with kids
who are on the other side of the screen, you might never know who they are or how they're engaging,
but know that they are there and know that that engagement is happening.
The picture on the right is actually a snapshot of our yoga storytime, and that's a little friend
of one of our librarians who was enjoying his time on the mat with Miss Mel kneel.
As we think about why we do it, is for the kids and families so really try to think about ways your
truthful self can connect with your virtual audience.
But it doesn't matter unless people know about it, right?
We need talk about promotion and marketing.
And there are varieties of ways you can promote your Virtual Storytimes, and I'm sure you at your
own library have a very clear sense of what are those avenues or channels for promotion.
How do you get the word out about what you're doing?
And, of course, because our virtual programs are online, a lot of the ways we can promote our
virtual services, our Virtual Storytimes, might be through digital.
Digital promotion.
And so having a landing page on your website about Virtual Storytimes, if you have a virtual
programs calendar that talks about all your virtual events, put it there.
Maybe your director is e-mailing out to all your customers because they just started cush side or
they are extending loans, or they're waving fines.
Think about ways to incorporate your Virtual Storytimes in the communication that goes out to the
public.
Maybe you have digital newsletters or some of you libraries that might be doing computer
appointments right now, if you have inside service us might have to do a little seen average our
plan for virtual programming and Virtual Storytime is probably to continue Virtual Storytime until
whether every that day is we're fully functional at a library again.
I have a feeling that Virtual Storytime is not going to go away.
I think our families and our communities now that they've experienced it, they appreciate the
flexibility of being able to watch and engage with storytime in a way that works for their families
it also helps those families who don't have access to the library.
And, maybe they're in the at-risk groups or they have, for any reason, a disability or a situation
that impedes them from being able to come to our spaces.
So I actually think it is not going to be a trend that's just reflective of the covid-19
environment, I think it is going to be here for a while.
Again with other promotional marketing materials, thinking about social media, here is a screen
shot of how we first promoted our Virtual Storytimes, and you know what we try to do now is include
as much diverse represent nation all of our photos, but, again, we're trying to get across the idea
that this is an experience provides engagement to families with kids so if you're looking for a
sample program description, here is ours.
Next door is another great way to promote, like via social media.
It is all about word of mouth and buzz marketing and who people know, so if your library has an
account on Nextdoor, that could be another place you think about promoting it.
And, for those in the management team that are on the call, you know, you want to think about both
internal ands ternal communication, as you would any time.
A digital sign is a TV screen, a flat screen inside of your library.
It could be very small, like a digital photo frame that rotates around slides to show different
information or it can be a very large, most TV screen like device that can show and broadcast
digital promotional materials so we have digital signs in all of our libraries and it sits on a
rotating slide show of information to promote a program or a service.
So I saw that question so I just wanted to answer that of course you want to know, you want to get
the word out externally.
I have a brief list, I'm sure there are ideas you all have to connect with in the communities to
talk about Virtual Storytimes, but because every staff member works with the public, whether it is
taking a public, to place a hold on and item or going out in the community, make sure you're
sharing this information with staff internally at your organization.
Great talking points or FAQs can even create a community partner e-mail template that any staff
member can send out to promote this opportunity to people they're connected with.
And we have the benefit of participating in a brief, short promo commercial sponsored by our
library consortium here in the Twin Cities.
MELSA, brings together six or seven metro area libraries so we filmed a special storytime and they
used part of it as a commercial that aired on our local PBS channel, which was exciting and a great
way to get the word out about the program.
Maybe there is a local public broadcasting channel or access in your community you can do a short
spot or commercial to let people know about it.
As we're finishing up here to talk today, you know, I think that with everything that we do, we
need to think about how we can improve and do it better.
But, also advocate for library services in jen ram one of the ways we can do -- in general, and one
of the ways we can do that is through evaluation of statistics.
I'm not going to go over this too much because all of the information is here, but these are some
of the questions you want to think about when you're creating virtual content.
You're not creating virtual content just for it to live there, you need to think about it as a way
to add ceo indicate for your library service because this is an aspects of your library service,
especially in these challenging times.
So these are the questions you want to think about and I've linked you to, and Jennifer put it in
the chat, we planned a survey to help plan future programs and it also appealed to some of the
state requirements for how we needed to evaluate some of our specially funded state programming, so
it all rolls into one survey, asking people not only about their experience but then it allows us
to gather the data and share with our state to report out.
Excuse me, I'm going to take a sip of water here.
Before I end with my top 10 tips, I want to say really quick about the statistics, every state has
their own state library association so you want to connect with them.
Either your state like other or the association, maybe either one of them can point you in the
direction of what type of statistics you need to compile for your virtual programming.
As we learned quickly, Minnesota and Colorado, for example, have two different definitions of what
they need for virtual statistics so you're going to want to go to your library, your state library
agency to figure out what you need.
Okay, I think if I were to do this even a year from now, I might have 10 totally different tips,
but over the last few months, this is what I've learned.
The only way that you can really look at how you're doing in Virtual Storytime is to watch
yourself.
It is an uncomfortable thing, not everybody is up for it, but it's the best way to learn and
improve.
So I would suggest recording yourself and watching it, as a way to continue to process in your on
going process of growing and getting better in your Virtual Storytime.
Again, with more these Terri terms do a full-out run through.
Full-out is a dance term my dance teacher in high school would always say give it everything you've
got.
Don't practice the turn, do it all the way.
So don't pretend to do the turn, do it all the way.
When you do your recording, do it full out like it was live, like people are watching.
Go through the whole program.
There is no way you're really going to know how the flow San how your transitions work and how
effective they are until you do it all the way.
Again, marking it.
I mentioned earlier, I put a little piece of tape on the floor to indicate where I need to have the
music stand go for when I.
Recording my book and where that exact position needs to be.
When you're setting up your virtual setting, it is really easy because you have a tripod and, as
long as you have the pry pod set, and everything marked exactly where it needs to be on the floor,
if things move in your set up, like that music stand, as long as you have a piece of tape on the
floor, for those in set design and theater background, as well, you're probably very familiar with
that term, the idea this is the position of the thing that you need to put in this location.
So, for example, if you know that your chair needs to go a certain amount of space in front of the
camera, just put a little piece of tape there so that you know that's always that location.
Excuse me, some more water.
Create a storytime set list.
I know I showed that you in my set up there, but also smile with your eyes.
Clearly, my voice is giving out a little bit, but that's okay.
This is something that I think is obvious to see when people do it and is not as obvious to notice
when they're not doing it.
Imagine you're smiling and it is hard because you can't see me in this virtual webinar, but imagine
you're smiling the biggest smile, the fullest smile you've ever smiled, and there is a certain flow
about you and even the position of your eyes, they change as opposed to just doing a fake smile
that doesn't really engaging your full face.
I think smiling with your eyes is something you can do in storytime in between your activities,
even when you're not necessarily smiling.
, against, another aspect of eye contact that really helps engage your audience.
Find community partners, they will connect you with your community and could help you with a
bilingual storytime, like I said earlier, and they can also draw your audience and create a larger
audience for your Virtual Storytimes.
Develop routines.
Every time we do storytime online in Virtual Storytime, we start with hello, friends, in ASL and we
close with ASL, good-bye, friends, and we also finish with a song, sing, talk, read, write, play.
And you can enjoy that song as you watch our Virtual Storytimes online and our Facebook page, but
it creates that sense of learning for kids.
They learn to know what to expect and it gets them ready for school.
Well, talking about your mistakes, I certainly, we had a little bit of a technology snafu here
today and I think that talking about your mistakes, if you are going to do live programming, it's
the most human and the most appropriate thing to help kids learn.
You know, we are not perfect and we are going to mess up.
You are going to mess up in storytime, and that is okay.
There is no level of perfection when it comes to Virtual Storytime, I think it is hard on us if we
have the high expectations perfection, it is not realistic.
And kids learn from adults in so many ways, so even just talking, active.
Noing your mistakes, not going on and on and on go it, but acknowledging them is human don't strive
for perfection, it will help you sleep at night.
Aim for connection.
It is at that moment kids are at home or wherever they are, engaging with you, learning about the
letter "b", singing that song and taking what they learned into the world after the storytime is
over.
And, so, with that, if you don't know, I am so excited to announce that the association for library
service children just announced and released their brand new Virtual Storytime services guide.
And, so, the link that I send earlier to the copyright and permissions chapter, that is part of
this wonderful guide.
It's brand new, there was a huge amount of collaboration with librarians from across the country,
and I just want to acknowledge and thank alsc for putting this site together.
You won't have to go any further than this guide and maybe this webinar to Lesh about Virtual
Storytime.
And so I'm really excited you all now have access to it.
A lot of librarians have been workingard had a and it is here for you now, so check it out so, with
that, I want to close by saying thanks for your flexibility earlier for the technology snafu and
thank you for joining us and joining me today to talk about Virtual Storytime.
Thank you to those who have contributed to chat and learning.
It is uncharted territory for us librarians so we're doing the best we can so if you learned one
thing today, I'll take that as a win.
If you want to connect me, I included my e-mail and Twitter handle.
Thank you to Jennifer and WebJunction for mosting this great talk.
>> Fantastic.
Thank you, Renee.
People were starting to trick well off but we will have the recording for them.
Lots of great interactive activity, thank you very much.
I will send you all an e-mail later today, once the recording, evening for many of you, once the
recording is available and I will send you gathered in Webex a certificate for your learning today
and others can always visit our catalog, the WebJunction catalog is free for all who work and
volunteer in libraries.
Finally, I will send you to a short survey on our staff on the youtube feed have provided a link to
our post webinar survey, we would love your feedback, we will share that with Renee and it helps us
guide our on going programming.
Again, thank you for being here and seven a great rest of your week.
Thanks, Renee.
>> Thank you.