my name is Jessie I work at the Thomas
crane public library I've spent hours of
the last four weeks immersed in JK
Rowling's mystery series featuring Iraqi
war veteran and a beauty cormoran strike
and his assistant turned partner Robin
Ellicott whose wholesome good looks and
solid middle-class background by her own
dramas said in London the first cormoran
strike installment titled Cuckoo's
calling introduces us to strike
illegitimate son of a legendary rock
star and his groupie girlfriend the
family friends and lovers who surround
strike and Robin and a satisfying
mystery involving the death of a famous
and troubled young model the second book
the silkworm takes us into the
fascinating and sometimes repellant
world of the London literary set as
strike and Robin unraveled the death of
a highly unlikable writer while the
third book career of evil plunges us
with more detail than I would have liked
into the worlds of three villains from
strikes past one of whom is a serial
killer the fourth book lethal white
whisks us out of the gutter and into the
houses of parliament as strike and Robin
tracked down someone much more dangerous
than the blackmailer they've been hired
to stop written under the pseudonym
Robert Galbraith the ear for dialogue
the close observation of human
relationships the shifting sands of
friendship and the unexpected terms that
accompany personal growth that made JK
Rowling's Harry Potter such a classic
find expression here too
the mysteries are solid and complex but
it's the chemistry between strike and
Robin and the author's tangible delight
in her
characters and in London itself that has
me reaching for the audio version when I
go out for a walk or wash dishes and for
the book when I head for bed at night
definitely read these in order and for
those of you who can't put these
mysteries down cormoran strike book five
is due out in September 2020 you can
find this series in eBook and eat audio
through the library's website have your
library card ready and look for the
titles on overdrive enjoy
hey everyone Shane here reference
librarian at the Thomas crane library
and today on Shan suggestions I'll be
talking about Joe Allen's powerful work
of historical true crime people wasn't
made to burn a true story of housing
race and murder in Chicago recounting a
long forgotten episode in Chicago
history mr. Allen's book tells the story
of James Hickman who in 1947 shot and
killed his landlord whom he believed was
responsible for the apartment fire that
tragically took the lives of his four
youngest children as news of Hickman's
murder case broke to the public an
incredible grassroots defense campaign
formed one that was not only able to
expose the systemic racism and poverty
that led to his crime but also helped
him win his freedom throughout the book
of vivid picture the racist policies of
1940 Chicago are portrayed most notably
in the housing where families of African
Americans were forced into overcrowded
and dilapidated tenement buildings with
no electricity no running water and
inaccessible fire escapes and locked
exit doors caused the loss of many
innocent lives with corruption and greed
leading such conditions to continue it
was inevitable a desperate man such as
James Hickman would end up taking the
law into his own hands
as both a suspenseful true crime story
as well as a thoroughly researched
history of the urban living conditions
african-americans continue to face
people wasn't made to burn remains a
timely reminder that as the more things
change the more they remain the same
welcome my name is Amanda and I'm one of
the children's librarians from the
Thomas crane public library in Quincy
Massachusetts this video is part of our
DIY children's program resources for
more program resources as well as ebooks
streaming movies TV music and much more
please visit Thomas crane library org
today we're going to do some color
chromatography now don't be intimidated
by the word chromatography it's a fancy
word for separating out a mixture of
things scientists can do chromatography
in lots of different ways but we don't
need fancy machines or chemicals to try
out a simple version ourselves what can
we separate marker ink all we need for
this activity is coffee filters white
will show the colors best that any sort
will do washable markers a cup or other
container with a little bit of water in
it and a pencil and some tape let's get
everything together let's get started
you can see I have all my materials
together now we have our coffee filters
which I've then cut into some strips
kids you may want your parents to help
you with this I have a glass of water
only about half an inch of water in the
bottom you don't want too much and then
I have a whole bunch of markers I have
lots of different colors to choose from
and I even have one extra black pen
you'll see why in just a moment
first we're going to start with blue and
red take one strip of your coffee filter
you're going to draw a line just about
an inch from the bottom you don't want
it at the very bottom because you don't
want the marker to actually touch the
water in the glass this is why you don't
need too much water in there if the
marker actually touches the water in the
glass instead of just the paper touching
it
then all of the ink will wash out into
the water and you won't get to see the
chromatography happen I've drawn a line
of red exactly over the line of blue so
they're in the same place sort of looks
black but they'll separate in the water
now take your tape and tape your piece
of paper onto your pencil so that the
end of the paper is going to just touch
in the water then take your pencil and
lay it across the top of your glass so
that the paper hangs down and the bottom
of it just touches the water what will
happen now is that the water will get
soaked up onto the paper and as it soaks
up the water will start to carry the ink
from the marker with it as you can see
the water has hit the ink and is
starting to go because we're using
washable markers the ink will dissolve
in the water and be carried along as the
water moves up the paper
already you can start to see the red ink
from the marker and the blue starting to
separate now this wouldn't happen
exactly this way if we used purple
because purple ink from a marker is made
in a different way than we normally
would make purple paint by mixing red
paint and blue together you can see the
ink starting to separate out this takes
some time though so let's try a
different one while we're waiting now
you can see why I'm using black I have
two different black markers one is a
felt-tip pen
and one is a black magic marker
both of these are water soluble which
means water will wash them away but
they're made by two different companies
using two very different types of ink
we're going to use our black pen to
suspend our black ink test strip over
the water once again
I'm going to use your tape and fold your
paper over your pen and tape it down so
that it will stay in place if you're
careful and don't let them touch you can
use the same glass of water for two
strips now let's see what happens when
the water starts to hit that black ink
do you think they'll look the same or
will they be different
look at the water starting to hit that
ink they definitely look different now
but how different will they be in the
end the magic marker seems to be much
darker and look it even has a little bit
of color in it whereas the pen just
still looks grey now again this is going
to take a little bit of time so we'll
let these sit and come back to them in
just a moment here we can see some of
these tests that we already did that
have had time to really soak up a lot of
water you can see on this one the blue
ink and the red ink are still a little
bit mixed together but they've separated
out quite a bit if we were to let this
one keep soaking eventually the red
would end up being near the bottom in
the middle and the blue would be carried
all the way up to the top companies that
make marker ink use different pigments
to do it these are different chemicals
that show up as different colors those
pigments are going to land in different
places the black ink that we tried you
can definitely see a difference now the
felt-tip pen stayed gray and just faded
as it soaked up onto the paper whereas
the washable marker separated into a
brown and a green
one of the reasons why it was carried up
so far is because the washable marker is
made to be washable it was made to
dissolve in water so it's easier for the
water to carry it whereas the felt tip
pen was made to be something we could
wash but probably not something that was
meant to be washed out quite so easily
now this took time but let's see it sped
up a little bit
try testing different inks you may have
in your house different markers in
different brands will behave very
differently when you test them this way
see what you can do and then use them as
bookmarks when you let them dry thanks
for watching and we'll see you next time
my name is Eileen I'm one of the Thomas
crane librarians and I'm here today with
Kerry our teen librarian she's gonna be
talking with us about the teen summer
reading program it's gonna be happening
shortly hi Carrie
hi Eileen how are you good good glad you
could join us thank you for having me
so why don't you tell us a little bit
about how teen summer Eddie's gonna work
this year with all the things that are
happening in the world yes so our teen
summer reading program like in years
past is what we call a reading incentive
based program that means that you read
books and log them on our software and
you attend activities and you earn
raffle tickets for each of those things
that can go towards our summer reading
prizes that we'll be giving away at the
end of summer and so there's two ways
that you can earn raffle tickets the
first way is by reading and completing
squares on our bingo card we've
traditionally had a 16 square bingo card
in the past that we've asked you to read
books and review this year we've
expanded it to 25 and done away with the
reviews so all we're gonna do is ask
that when you log your book you give us
one thing in the activity track that you
liked or did not like about the book and
that's all you have to do to earn a
raffle ticket and the bingo squares can
be anything from read a book with the
male main character to a fantasy book to
a book recommended to you by a librarian
so you have a lot of flexibility in the
books you can choose you just have to
find a way to justify it being in that
square and you're good to go and the
second way that you can earn raffle
tickets we are going to be doing some
online programs this summer with
anything going on we won't be able to do
in-person programs that we will be doing
a number of programs online we'll be
having some digital escape rooms we are
going to be doing some food challenges
and trivia nights as well in addition to
that we're going to have some activities
for you to kind of complete and do on
your own at home or outside in your
neighborhood so those are the two basic
ways that you can earn tickets for this
summer reading so have you decided on
some dates yet or is it still planning
yep so we're gonna be kicking off on
July 1st that's when you can officially
begin to start logging your books and
then the program will wrap up on August
28th and that's when we will be doing
the drawings the digital drawings for
the raffle tickets for the summer
reading prizes this summer and
registration will begin about the middle
of June so you'll have a couple weeks
ahead of time from when you register to
when the program actually starts and so
we're using bean stack again this year
so some people might be familiar with
that and the digital tickets that you
guys are going to be doing yes so we've
used bean stack for the last few years
for our summer reading program so if you
have an account from years past it'll
work again this year and last year was
the first year that we were able to do
digital raffle tickets and years past
we've always had physical ones but this
year with everything going on we're
gonna really take advantage of those
digital tickets and the way it works is
that whenever you create or check off
that you've done something on the
activity track you will earn raffle
ticket for that so you'll be assigned a
raffle ticket and then you will be able
to take that raffle ticket in your
account and enter it into the raffle
baskets that we're going to be giving
away at the end of the summer and so
just a clarification about how you're
using the bingo cards you can't really
use one book for two squares is that
right
that is correct so for example if I
recommend to you a fantasy
book you can't use that same book for
both the recommended by a librarian and
the fantasy square you have to use two
separate looks good to know so and they
find out where your online programs are
going to be so they can find them on our
website they can also find them on our
teen Instagram page the handle for that
is teens Act II Cpl that has all of the
most up-to-date information on our
programs it has all of the links to the
online events the day of the event as
well but that link will also be in our
calendar of events that you can find on
our web page well good so you sound like
you might have a recommendation or two
for us can you get us started on that
sure so the first book that I'm going to
recommend today is a great middle grade
book it is a story called Tristan strong
punches a hole in the sky and it is
written by Kwame Amalia um he is writing
and publishing under the Rick Riordan
Disney presents imprint so if you're
familiar with Rick Riordan and you have
read any of his Percy Jackson books or
his Magnus chase books what you'll
notice is that these books are adventure
quest books they're all very similar
Tristan kind of falls right into that
same sort of genre the book is about a
young boy named Tristan strong who loses
his best friend Eddie in a bus accident
and he has to be shipped off to his
family his grandparents farm down in
Alabama and he's not handling it very
well and it's late at night and these
mythical creatures kind of break into
his room and steal Eddie's journal and
he goes off in a chase they get into a
fight and in the midst of this fight he
manages to punch a hole into the sky and
it releases all of these sort of
mythical creatures what I really liked
about this book is that we're you know
at this point pretty familiar with Greek
mythology and Roman mythology
and even some Egyptian mythology Kwami
and bhayya is from West Africa and so
all of the mythology interest and strong
is actually West African mythology so
we're being exposed to this whole new
universe of characters and gods it's
fast paced it's an adventure story
there's quests friendships some humor in
there it's a great read and it's the
first in a series so if you like it
there is much more after this
that's coming well that sounds really
exciting and I would like to read that
myself actually so I have one as well it
is a fantasy book probably much like
your pick and it's called strange the
dreamer by Laini Taylor it is a book
that's a little bit late for more mature
readers but it is so it's probably one
of the best fantasy books I've ever read
and I've read a lot of fantasy books
it's about an orphan and a librarian
named Lazlo Strange and he has a lot of
dreams about this mythical city named
weep and a lot of people don't believe
that it exists
he believes that it's out there
somewhere so he decides to leave his
comfortable little job in the library to
go and find weep and gods who supposedly
have lived there so it's it's very
exciting there's a little romance
there's a great villain who's like a
child I don't want to spoil too much but
it is very fascinating and one thing I
really like about it is that Lanie's
writing style it goes so quickly there's
no flag or anything I inhaled this book
which is kind of a bigger book so don't
be afraid of that but I inhaled this
book within a few days there's a huge
cliffhanger at the end that you're not
going to believe but it's full of
adventure a great magic world
and definitely check it out it's part of
a duology she wrote music music
nightmares that came out last year and
they're both on Libby a book and
audiobook so definitely check both of
them out
you just go right into making use of
nightmares which is also really wraps it
up really well definitely highly
recommended and she have another one
carry for us um yeah I have a one more
I'm actually currently listening to the
new Suzanne Collins book the battle
ballad of songbirds and snakes
so if you were a fan of the Hunger Games
if you really loved the world that she
built there this is President Snow's
origin story so this is the story that
really delves into how Caronia Cornelius
snow became who he was in The Hunger
Games he is from the Capitol and he is
going to be a mentor towards one of the
tributes in that year's Hunger Games
this brings us right back into that
world that we love we get to see a whole
new cast of tributes he is going to be
mentoring someone from district 12 so
you do be yet a nice strong female lead
that we saw with Katniss Everdeen and we
get to see some characters from the
series that we had seen in previous
books we do get to see tigress in her
connection with Cornelius I'm not going
to tell you too much about the story but
it is available to listen right now on
hoopla and it is available as an e-book
and overdrive I do know there are holds
on it so if you want to get your hot
little hands on it now I would recommend
taking it for a listen on hoopla well
yeah that's definitely one that's gonna
be very popular in the coming weeks I'm
sure so thank you Carrie for joining us
there's a number of ways that you guys
can reach us ask questions get
recommendations join us at Thomas crane
library dot or you could call us at six
one seven three seven six one one zero
to follow us on Facebook Twitter or
Instagram YouTube and especially the
teen Instagram can you give us that
handle one
time carry yeah sure it is teens Matt
tcpo okay so that's where you're gonna
find that most the most stuff that you
can well and thank you carry thank you
very much thank you for having me thank
you
hi I'm a stander I'm the librarian over
at the point Webster middle school and
today I'm going to show you how to
access and use the biography and
contacts database to find information
about people so we're going to start out
at the Thomas crane library site it's
Thomas crane library org as you can see
up here we're going to come over to
where it says research and then
databases I'm here we can search
databases by subject go to biography and
then biography in context all the in
context databases work pretty much the
same way we'll go through starting with
biography here so if you know the
person's name you're looking for you can
just enter them right here in the search
box there are different ways to browse
and search for people I will let you
explore those on your own now if we
start with somebody who is very well
known let's go as those because we can
now there's a lot of information on
David Bowie so at the top they give you
this bar about him
they're giving you blurb from one of the
articles they give you the quick facts
then if you scroll down a little now
it's showing you there's featured
content and usually the featured content
it's something from there that makes it
into this overview block the biography
is in this case it says there are nine
of them but it's only showing us 30 so
now we can click through there and up up
at the top right now we've selected just
biographies but you can also find things
out of magazines out of newspapers
sometimes video sometimes audio like
record interviews and things like that
so you can take a look through right now
I'm just sticking with biographies now
next to each one there's a symbol with a
content level and the more stars it has
the more complex it is so you can filter
your results to just certain content
levels if you want you don't need to so
now when you find an article that you
want you can just go right into it and
I'm going to use this one because it's a
slightly shorter one now it gives you
the title of the article when it was
published where it was published and
some information about it you can have
the article translated into many
languages whenever is easiest for you
you can enlarge you can change the font
size put that back and you can listen to
it it is just text-to-speech you need to
stop that because I don't want to listen
to it now you've got the whole text of
the article
bibliography down here at the bottom
there's the option for the source
citation you can just copy and paste
this right into your report and not have
to worry about did I cite it properly
did I set it up properly now across the
top here you also have a cite button and
that does the exact same thing at the
middle school level we mostly use MLA
but check with your teacher to see if
you should be citing in MLA style APA
style or Chicago style you can have the
article sent directly into your Google
Drive or you can email it to yourself
you can download the article you can
print it out and you can get what's
called a permalink now this is a link
where whenever you use this particular
link it will take you to this article
nowhere else if you use the URL up here
in the address bar it will not
to this article again this is what's
known as a dynamic URL so now if we were
to look for somebody who is perhaps a
little less famous let's go with James
Prowler he's a writer he has written for
young kids and Tino dances
now it brings up a screen like this and
we just go straight into the biographies
everything else here works pretty much
the exact same way so this is just a
very quick overview of how the biography
database works and how you can get into
other parts of it now you can dig
through and filter your results and
things like that again all the in
context databases work pretty much the
same way and if you have any questions
please by all means get in touch with
either the local library or your school
librarian thank you
