Liar & Spy Audiobook: Give It a Listen

In Liar & Spy, Georges’ best friend has left him to join the popular kids, and now Georges is alone and bullied at school. When his family moves into a new apartment building, he finds a note advertising a spy club and soon finds himself joining to spy on mysterious neighbor Mr. X with his new best friend Safer. But not all is as it appears to be in this funny, tense, beautifully-layered novel.

After listening to it myself, I can say that translates into an excellent audiobook, especially during those edge-of-your-seat moments, which really did have me on the edge of my seat.

Liar & Spy is written by Rebecca Stead, whose previous novel, When You Reach Me, won the Newbery Medal in 2010.

Book Journals

Do you keep track of all the books you read? When you get that book report assignment, do you have several titles to choose from? Do you remember what each book was about?
A book journal is a good way to keep track of the books that you read.
Come to the Pittsfield Branch on Tuesday, February 19, 2013 at 2:00 p.m. and make
a journal that you can use to track your reading history.
We'll show you how to make paper journals as well as online ones.
This is for kids in grades K - 5. All supplies will be provided.

For some ideas, look here.

Dragons Love Tacos

Dragons Love Tacos by Adam Rubin is one funny picture book. I recently read this to my small relations and we were all cracking up. The book features a crew of taco-loving dragons. They LOVE tacos! (I mean, who doesn’t?) They love all kinds of tacos. They also love parties. Especially taco parties. BUT! Dragons do not like spicy salsa of any kind, ever. Of course the dragons end up at a taco party serving spicy salsa! If you want to know how it ends you’ll have to grab this funny book off the shelf and give it a read. Grown-ups, you'll have as much fun as the kids.

For more picture books about dragons check out this list, and for more funny picture books check out this list.

Another Big Winner from Jon Klassen

This is Not My Hat is a clever, gorgeous picture book, a 2013 Caldecott Medal book, and a must-read for anyone connected with children in preschool through first grade and beyond. Jon Klassen repeats the theme from his 2011 bestseller I Want My Hat Back and adds a smart twist. The story opens with the memorable lines "This hat is not mine. I just stole it," spoken by a brave little fish who has lifted a blue bowler hat from a big sleeping fish. Little fish swims quietly to a hiding place, not knowing -- but we know -- that the big fish is chasing him. When the two fish vanish into seaweed, the words stop, and big fish reemerges with the blue hat on his head. The story is simple and works beautifully.

A six-year-old Amazon reviewer echoes what many people, young and older, are saying about this gem of a book: "I liked the story and I liked the big fish. The bubbles create movement. The little fish was bad and the big fish was just a big fish. You don't steal from a big fish."

Preschool Expo

Are you in the market for a preschool? Are you looking for a good place to start your search? Then you should come to the Preschool Expo on January 27th! What is the Preschool Expo? It’s an event that brings representatives from many area preschools to one location, on one date. That way, it’s easy to gather information on preschools and talk with schools in order to find a good fit for your child! This free event is co-sponsored by the Ann Arbor District Library, Washtenaw Success by Six Great Start Collaborative, Child Care Network, and U-M Work/Life Resource Center. Come explore your options at the Preschool Expo!

Date: Sunday, January 27th
Time: 1:00 – 4:00p.m.
Place: Palmer Commons on the U-M Campus
100 Washtenaw Ave.
(Located at the intersection of Central and Medical Campuses)
Parking: Free parking available in the structure across the street from Palmer Commons

An Audiobook for Young Harry Potter Fans

Fans of J. K. Rowling's Harry Potter series and especially fans of the audiobooks narrated by Jim Dale may be interested to learn about The Worst Witch audiobook by Jill Murphy.

Like the Harry Potter series, The Worst Witch takes place at a school for young witches (though no young wizards here), complete with broomstick lessons, potion tests and uniforms with house colors. At Miss Cackle's Academy, we meet Mildred Hubble, dubbed the worst witch at the school because of her talent for getting into trouble. What kind of trouble? How about turning a rude classmate into a pig! (She meant to turn her into a toad, you see.) It's a short but magical story -- and very funny too.

Oh, yes, and did I mention that it's narrated by Miriam Margoyles, whom you may remember as Professor Sprout in Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets?

The audiobook series continues with The Worst Witch Strikes Again and The Worst Witch All at Sea.

Extra Yarn

Extra Yarn by Mac Barnett is one beautiful picture book. It has the potential of winning a Caldecott Medal, thanks to Jon Klassen's beautiful illustrations. The story features young Annabelle who comes across a box containing some yarn. But a magical thing happens! She knits and knits and knits and the yarn never seems to run out. So she knits sweaters for dogs, and people, and trees, and cars, and soon the entire monochromatic town is awash in color thanks to her handiwork. The greedy archduke decides to steal her magic box, which leaves Annabelle in a bit of stitchuation. Will she knit her way out of it?

Delightful Audiobook for Kids

Did you ever want to learn to play the piano?

That’s what ten-year-old Zoe Elias wants more than anything in the world, but when her father brings home an organ rather than an elegant baby grand, Zoe’s dreams of playing concerts at Carnegie Hall are replaced with competing in the local Perform-O-Rama organ competition. It may not be what Zoe expected, but she just might find it a crooked kind of perfect.

Linda Urban’s debut novel, set here in Michigan, is funny and poignant and hopeful as it chronicles Zoe’s musical dreams, her quirky family and her lost and found friendships. Give A Crooked Kind of Perfect a listen.

Family Science Workshop: Just Like Me?

Saturday January 12, 2013: 10:00 am to 11:00 am -- Pittsfield Branch: Program Room

What makes us different? What makes us the same?

Families will learn about the biological reasons behind skin color, hair texture and explore other inherited genetic traits like the ability to taste certain compounds. Families will also get to perform a DNA extraction.

This event is for grades K-5 with an adult.

LEGO Connection!

Sunday, January 6 | 1-2:30pm | Malletts Creek | Grades K-5 with parent

Join us for a LEGO adventure! Here’s a chance to get connected with other LEGO-minded people and build great things at the library! During this event, we’ll have a load of LEGO bricks for you to use to make something cool as you make new friends. At the end of our adventure the LEGOs will stay at the library before you head onto your next adventure. This time around we’re focusing on LEGO architecture by building buildings! Not you’re thing? No problem, you can make whatever you want. But if you are into LEGO architecture, check out the LEGO Architecture: Towering Ambition exhibit at The Henry Ford.

If you’re looking for books for some LEGO inspiration, check out AADL’s collection of great LEGO books! We’ve got books including how to build stuff, the history of LEGOs, and even stories featuring minifigs!

Syndicate content
http://www.aadl.org/research/sites/kids?page=13
www.aadl.org
crawl=CC-MAIN-2014-41
43290
application/http; msgtype=response
sha1:K2XLX7PN5JZWK5JFMWTKRUGTUSAMWDW5
<urn:uuid:5fdb3d52-5919-4fa3-b1ba-86d45ca4bc93>
2014-09-18T21:52:24Z
204.38.4.4
sha1:IKWRAL2VQEJ5ZHCFIH2NONLMKVR2L6SF
<urn:uuid:4a75adbd-bdbd-4635-baa4-6146e750c404>
http://www.aadl.org/research/sites/kids?page=13
response
<urn:uuid:f052bbe9-f5d4-49b7-b3d6-bb6552cbac70>
robots: classic
hostname: ip-10-196-40-205.us-west-1.compute.internal
software: Nutch 1.6 (CC)/CC WarcExport 1.0
isPartOf: CC-MAIN-2014-41
operator: CommonCrawl Admin
description: Wide crawl of the web with URLs provided by Blekko for September 2014
publisher: CommonCrawl
format: WARC File Format 1.0
conformsTo: http://bibnum.bnf.fr/WARC/WARC_ISO_28500_version1_latestdraft.pdf