Storytime 2013

Since I always forget to post the dates - and they are introuvables on the library's website - I'm posting all the 2013 storytime dates here. For once and for all...at least until June.

We are trying to do thematic storytimes and I'll add in more songs since, let's face it, "Head Shoulders Knees and Toes" is getting really really old!

Come one, come all!

Saturday, 12 January  at 10:30
Wednesday, 6 February at 15:30
Saturday, 16 February at 10:30 (Valentine's Day)
Wednesday, 6 March at 15:30
Wednesday, 3 April at 15:30
Saturday, 13 April at 10:30
Wednesday, 15 May at 15:30
Saturday, 25 May (to be confirmed) Poids Plume
Saturday, 15 June at 10:30

(Lecture bilingue anglais-français "storytime". gratuit et amusant!)

For a fairly complete list of books we've read in the past, you can check out my amazon list.

American CP Lesson 1 : How the Bear Lost Its Tail (and Native Americans)

Last week, I did my first of 6 American culture  lessons in Suzanne's CP class. I was really nervous about it and planned for worst case scenario...

I decided to start out by asking the class if  they knew why I wasthere. Once boy replied, "parceque vous êtes anglaise!" which is a mistake even my daughte makes. I explained to them that I speak English but come from America.  In a sign of proper deference to the teacher,  I told them I would teach them a little English and some things about the United States but that I wasn't going to teach them English like their teacher, Madame G. In order to bring the idea closer to home, I showed them a comic book they all seem to know : Yakari which is s a French comic about a little native American boy.

Since I couldn't actually get my hands on a book, I had to make my own with a compilation of pictures I grabbed off the internet and color copies form books I'd found at the library. I began by  testing the kids on the words in the way I'd learned to as a trainer at Berlitz so many years ago. Once they'd gotten works like bear, fox and tail and the name of the American animals I'd chosen (racoon, chipmunk, moose, eagle...), I told them the story.

I was inspired by this video by professional storyteller Mike Lockett when I told the story. I tried to be as animated and slow as he was lines each time, making it easy for them to understand, inspired by this telling of the story.  This was a great resource. 

When I finished, I asked the kids in French what they understood and, not surprisinly, the kids seemed to understand exactly what happened.

I then showed the kids a picture of foods we know thanks to Native Americans and tested  them on the English. Foods such as: corn, beans, pumpkin, tomato, potato, turkey...

And to finish, I asked the kids if they knew any NAtive American words. They of course said no to which I replied, "Je suis sûre que si". I'm sure you do! From this wikipedia list, I'd chosen words that exist in the English language that are also used in French. I said the words in English and asked the children to guess the French. I was surprised how quickly they got things like avocado and tomato. And amused how long it took them to figure out anorak, which they guess anything from a food to an animal.

Since the focus wasn't a real English lesson but rather a cultural lesson about the United States, I was free to explain in French which I think got the point across better.

At the end of the lesson, the teacher thanked me and I said bye to the kids. And as a sign of what I consider success, the teacher used the informal tu with me as I was leaving!

I'll also add how proud I was of Suzanne who spoke up in front of her whole class in English without a second thought. It shows me that she's not ashamed or scared to show others that she's different which is every parents' goal...

For next week's lesson, I plan on building on the Native American theme and using the food vocabulary as a segway into an explanation of Thanksgiving and other American holidays.

English lessons in CP : How the bear lost his tail

Ever since Suzanne started école maternelle, I always imagined me having some sort of role in the classroom. But, it has proven to be more difficult than I expected. Working is one of the problems. But it's always because parents just aren't as active here as in the US. So my input has been minimal thus far, although I've managed to go into her class at least once a year to talk about something American or in English. My interest in going into her class is twofold. First, it's interesting for the kids to hear from people from other places. Second, if I'm in the class, Suzanne will be proud and maybe it won't be so "strange" for her to be bilingual. (and third, I don't want her to reject her American side...)

Suzanne is now in her first year of école primaire. At the beginning of this school year (Suzanne's in CP=1st grade), I once again offered my services as a Native English speaker....and got nothing back. Then about a month ago, the teacher called me (she left a message on my phone that I heard a week later. oops). Since then, we've played email tag with me sending long emails explaining what I'd like to do and her responding "ok". Not very constructive for me...

So the final guidelines I have are these:

• 30 minutes
• 6 lessons are scheduled between now and end of January
• focus on culture and civilization
• subjects they won't see  with their regular English teacher (ie vocab, etc).

So I did a lot of brainstorming about WHAT to talk to them about and came up with the following subjects :

1. Native Americans
2. American food (linked with immigration)
3. American sports
4. American holidays
5. American school and games
6. and I forget the 6th one for now...

Next, I had to think about HOW to talk to them. Since the teacher didn't specifically ask for only English and she clearly said (the only clear thing she said) was that I am not teaching them English, I decided on the following set-up for each lesson : 

• Book (or story) in English: this will provide a subject for discussion
• English voabulary: taken from thebook and the subject matter
• song or dance: this will help them be interactive
• food : where applicable (since I'm a foodie)

Today's lesson is on Native Americans. I'll try to provide an update tomorrow including description of the lesson, what worked and what didn't. The point is to provide a resource for other parents who may be doing similar activities in their kid's CP class.

To be honest, I'm terrified. I'm terrified of the kids but also of the teacher. She has shown no enthusiasm at all and has not been particularly helpful. At the same time, the fact that she actually asked me to come into class is a positive sign (I also had to sign some sort of official document for the rectorat ie the superintendant).

So today...How the Bear Lost His Tail...

Storytime: the new season

And we're back! The first bilingual storytime of the new season is this Wednesday, September 19th at 15:30 at the Wazemmes library in Lille. There are some exciting new things planned for the fall including a special Halloween reading and a special Scary Monsters edition in early November.

Come one, come all!

for more information, please leave me a message.

May story time and Max speaks franglais

I'm extremely excited to announce the dates for he May storytime for a couple of reasons. First because storytime is cool. Second because storytime is super cool this month because we'll be doing a special edition and third because Multilingual Living published an article I wrote about storytime.

So the dates: the normal Wednesday storytime will take place on May 23rd at 3:30pm at the Wazemmes library. Then, we'll have a special storytime at Gare  Saint Sauveur on May 26th at 2:00pm. There is a book fair and lots of special events going on so we're part of the festivities. It's really exciting because Stéphane Servant, the author of Le Machin/The Thing, will be there for sign books. So he'll hopefully get to see what we've done with his dual language book.

I promise it will be so very cool.

Since story time has really taken off, I contacted Multilingual Living, a really amazing webzine on all aspects of multi-lingual life. And the result is this article that I hope will be helpful to anyone else looking for ideas on how to increase the multi-lingual presence in your life. So here it is: Bilingual Storytime.

On another note, Max is increasingly proficient in franglais. I've previously said that Max doesn't mix his languages...and he didn't until the past couple weeks. I'm not sure what happened, maybe it's just the age where he's trying to say more things and doesn't have the words or grammar to do so in a single language. or maybe he's finally decided that not everything is black and white and can't be compartmentalized. In the past week I've heard Max use English grammar in French sentences a few times and use a couple of words in the wrong language. For example, he said "je veux les" to his grandparents which is a perfect translation of "I want them" (and he really did want those chips!). He also said "C'est pas droit" to his grandmother when she put on his boot. She thought it was funny because it wasn't right as in the direction (ie left and right) but what he meant was literally "it's not on right" ie the sock was scrunched up in his boot and it didn't feel right.

Another thing to note is that the kids spent all weekend with their grandparents speaking French. When I spoke to Suzanne on the phone yesterday, her English sounded French. It was very strange and interesting to see how quickly her language adapted.

Oh, tower of babble...

Storytime : spring has sprung!

Storytime at the Wazemmes Library has really taken off. The February dates were successful. The Saturday reading took place on the Saturday that school vacation started. Since my mother was our “guest reader”, I recruited some friends to make sure there’d be at least some kids. And to my surprise, the room was overflowing with both kids and their parents! There were at least 20 people crammed into the little room at the back of the Médiatheque Marie-Claude Vaillant-Couturier!

We didn’t have a French librarian with us that day, so I took over the French part (at one point reading the English instead! Old habits die hard). My mother and I read a couple of books in bilingual format to get the kids acquainted and then I let my mother do her librarian thing. She told the story of Joseph’s little overcoat, using paper and scissors to tell the story. She then read a couple of simple books in English, finishing with an English translation of a French book called Press Here (or Un Livre) by Hervé Tullet which is a book that screams for crowd participation. But the kids wouldn’t participate. By the time my mother was done, all of the kids were grabbing and pressing and shaking the book (this is normal behavior for this book which asks the reader to do all those things to move the spots around on the pages).

My mother observed how reticent the kids were. Where American kids would have been geting up and repeating the words or pressing the book, the French kids sat still and listened. This harkens back to my participation theory of the French which I’ve already observed in professional settings. But I digress...

March story time dates are Wednesday, March 21st at 3:30PM and Saturday, March 31st at 10:30AM .

Here is a list of books we have read so far and which seem to work well in the bilingual setting and format. There are both books in French and English, and there are some bilingual in the text.

• Le Machin/ the Thing by Stéphane Servant and Cécile Bonbon
• Bark George/ Aboie George by Jules Feiffer
• What a Radish! / Quel radis dis donc!  by Praline Gay-Para and Andrée Prigent  
• Little Blue, little Yellow / Petit Bleu, Petit Jaune by Leo Lionni
• A Color of His Own  / Une histoire de cameleon  by Leo Lionni
• The Pigeon Finds a Hotdog/ Le Pigeon Trouve un Hotdog by Mo Willems
• What Faust Saw/ La Nuit de Faust by Matt Ottley
• Yummy / Je te croquerai byLucy Cousins
• Elephant and Piggie : there’s a bird on your head / Un Oiseu sur la tête by Mo Willems
• I like Books/J’aime les livres by Anthony Brown
• Willy the Dreamer / Marcel le reveur  by Anthony Brown
• My Dad / Mon Papa by Anthony Brown
• My Mum / Ma Maman by Anthony Brown
• I Want My Dinner/ Je Veux Manger by Tony Ross
• Brown Bear, Brown Bear / Ours Brun, Ours Brun by Eric Carle
• We’re Going on a Bear Hunt /  La Chasse à l'ours by Helen Oxenbury
• Tralalire : Ours Bleu et Tigre Rouge - a bilingual text from issue 116 from july 2010)
• La maitresse dit hello by Kris di Giacomo
• Tout le Dit Hello by Kris di Giacomo
• Farmer Duck / Le canard fermier by Martin Waddell and Helen Oxenbury
• Press Here / Un Livre - Hervé Tullet
• Come Out and Play Little Mouse  /Viens jouer avec moi, petite souris! x by Robert Kraus, Jose Aruego and Ariane Dewey

Other books in English that work well for a non-English speaking group:

• Cat the Cat by Mo Willems
• Orange, Pear, Apple Bear by Emily Gravett
• Press Here by Hervé Tullet
• Monday Spaghetti by Eric Carle
• Jazzy in the Jungle by Lucy Cousins
• ABCs by Bruno Munari
• Red Hat, Green Hat by Sandra Boynton

Story time : exciting times!

February story time will take place on Wednesday, February 8th at 3:30 and Saturday, February 25th at 10:30.

Tomorrow's edition will feature a new book and a slightly new format. The library director will be taking on the French reading since my usual counterpart, Marie, is off skiing. Marie has some great ideas so hopefully we'll have lots of little people to help us out!

My mother, a retired children's librarian, will be our guest star at the February 25th reading. My mom, once known for reading bedtime stories in her pajamas at the public library, has lots of surprises up her sleeves. She will be fully clothed.

If you would like to sign up or have any questions, please contact me here or get in touch with the Wazemmes branch of the Bibliothèque Municipale de Lille.

Now some French for the French search engine:

Lecture gratuite anglais-français à la médiathèque de Wazemmes (Lille) aura lieu mercredi 8 février à 15h30 et samedi 25 février  à 10h30.  Pour touts renseignements, laissez-moi un commentaire ou contactez la médiathèque de Wazemmes .

story time: the rebirth

Story time is finally coming to life! I didn't realize the beginning would be so rough...or that the rough period would last so long. We are celebrating a whole year.

Since the new director arrived at the library, everything's been looking up! My counterpart librarian and I have a rhythm and a solid and fun repertoire now so the readings are smooth. Last Saturday, there were 2 new families; last Wednesday, there were 2 returning families (plus my friends who have been endlessly supportive of this endeavor!).

The head librarian has been answering emails that were left untouched for months, among them a request for Saturday "camp" to come to the readings (20 kids!). We also have dates booked through June, including a reading at the Gare St. Sauveur during the Braderie des Livres. The Gare St. Sauveur is an unused freight train station transformed into an amazing cultural space in Lille.

People have been coming to me saying they have seen the posters up around town, including Story time with Rebecca (et l'équipe jeunesse de la bibliothèque). It's all very exciting. 

But the best part ? It's the kids...My kids really appreciate the language play, where we intermingle French and English in the same story. It reinforces their own bilingualism. As for the monolingual kids, it's showing them that language is fun and accessible. They really enjoy the stories and the new words! An, of course, discovering new books like, The Thing/ Le Machin, is always good.

I'll continue to post future dates here. Come one, come all!

Story time: January 2011

The next story time is Wednesday, January 11th at 3:30 pm.

I'm hoping the new year will bring new luck to my little project. I can't begin to explain how much more pleasure and satisfaction I get from reading to kids for 30 minutes than I do from a full day of work (unless that day includes a German Black Forest cake baked by my German co-worker or some hard alcohol from my Latvian co-worker).

The new director has finally arrived at the Wazemmes branch library and seems really keen on story time. The last session right before holidays was English only because the librarian was sick. But we still had a nice crew of 7 kids. SEVEN which apparently is a really good number. I would have thought a dozen but ok, seven. She said that we should send emails out to the schools to attract more kids and groups. Yay!

So please come and enjoy some stories in French and English, in a bilingual setting. It's free and it's fun!

Storytime : double whammy!

This week saw the double edition of storytime. On Wednesday, the group was composed of 10 6-8 year olds and my two little monsters and my friend Anne's bilingual kids. Suzanne pulled up a chair next to me and read her own books- although she enjoys storytime, it was understandably much less fun without any of her friends. Marie and I mostly reused some of the stories we'd done previously including Le Machin which works amazingly bilingually. but we also did "Three Billy Goats Gruff" from Yummy by Lucy Cousins. Her versions of the fairy tales are straight to the point and lend themselves well to split, bilingual reading. The group was enthusiastic and able to retain a certain number of words. The already had a good base which helped. Saturday's group was completely different. There were 4 kids plus my 2. All of the kids were between 3 and 6. Marie and I did some of the younger books including What Faust Saw, I Want My Potty, I Like Books and I'm Going on a Bear Hunt, the latter is a great exercise in otomotopea (isn't that a great word?!). The parents were enthusiastic and so is Marie, despite the issues the library is currently facing.

When we finished, she told me that there was an administrative mess up so storytime in November and December wouldn't apprear in the library agenda but that there would be flyers made for the library. She also told me that she didn't mind doing one Wednesday and one Saturday a month. I'm getting the feeling that she's enjoying storytime!

I wanted to do some Halloween stories but the library didn't have any that were easy enough to read to a mixed group of kids. Tant pis.

Other notable moments of the weekend included my distribution of Halloween fliers to all my neighboors at 11pm on Friday night in an attempt to remain visibly invisible. This is my attempt to bring Halloween to my street. One neighbor has already decorated her windows. Another told me that as long as kids didn't come ringing their bell and asking for candy, they would do Halloween. Um, yeah. My kids are extremely excited for Halloween. I've got to start working on Suzanne's ghost costume!

On Sunday, as the kids and I walked through the Wazemmes market square on our way back from visiting La Ferme des Dondaines, Suzanne asked me, "can we speak French together so people won't know we're English?" I decided not to correct her on the semantics of it - English versus American and the fact that I just physically cannot speak French to my kids. But when I asked her why she didn't want people to know we spoke English, she said, "because I don't want to go to prison." I then explained to Suzanne that in France, people don't get sent to prison for speaking a different language and that we should be proud to speak English AND French. I sometimes wonder how much the bilingualism adds to the insecure musings of the common 5 year old.

But seeing the semi-popularity of storytime, I don't think we need to worry about being imprisoned for a little while at least.

Storytime : October, November, December

The fate of storytime is in your hands...
Actually, it's in the hands of the city government. The Wazemmes library has lost 3 staff members since the beginning of storytime last spring. But Marie, my storytime partner, is standing behind it. We met this morning to set dates until the end of the year. And although the library is understaffed, she is firmly standing by storytime and all of the other animations planned by the library.

Storytime is a victim of its own success in many ways. The word is out and it's a little too loud! Marie informed me this morning that a group of ten 6-8 year old will be attending next Wednesday as part of the public day camp's activity. She also handed me an email from another Saturday morning program organized by the city. The email basically says we heard the library has a bilingual program and we'd like to work that into our Saturday morning language initiation program that's part of the city's PEG (plan d'education global ie the city's education plan which includes more access to foreign language education).

So, although I'm flattered to be the library's "bilingual program", I need to think long and hard about how I can 1) accomodate the demands and 2) make this into something real, profitable and with a future. Because, who would I be kidding if I said that I'd much rather play with european money than read to little kids all day long. But I digress...

Storytime dates are as follows :
October 12th and 15th
November 12th and 23rd (in time for Thanksgiving!)
December 10th and 21st

Wednesday is at 3:30pm. Saturday is at 10:30am.

If you need more information, you can contact me through this blog or get in touch with the Mediatheque de Wazemmes at 03 20 12 84 68
From January onwards, storytime will take place Wednesday OR Saturday depending on the popularity of the test dates we've had in the fall.

Storytime September

Storytime is back, although the head librarian who has been so supportive has left the local library. Hopefully the staff will continue to be so supportive of the monthly bilingual free readings!

DAtes for September are Wednesday, September 7th at 3:30 and Saturday, September 24th at 10:30. We're testing the Saturday to see if we get more people.

if you have questions, leave me a message or contact the Médiathèque de Wazemmes.

It's bilingual, it's free and it's fun!

Storytime June : Woohoo!

In a single word: AWESOME.

June's storytime was great. There was an enthusiatic crowd, including lots of new faces (all of whom I knew at least indirectly). But still, the room at the back of the library was packed.
Marie and I had prepared ahead but we were out of synch for a couple of books because the translations aren't always exact or because we tried to vary our style too much, sometime reading every other page, sometimes reading every other line. But, everyone seemed to love it. The energy in the room was great!

We read We're Going on a Bear Hunt which was, surprisingly, a huge hit. The kids (and adults) liked hearing the difference between the French and English onomatopoeia. We read Little Blue, Little Yellow which I did for the first storytime in English only; it works extremely well in bilingual format. Polar Bear, Polar Bear didn't work as well as we'd expected because the translation takes artistic liberty on the last page and even adds in a line! I guess it's all in the name of rythm, but still...We also read a bilingual book that I can't remember. And then I finished with Every Peach, Pear, Plum which the kids loved. They all gathered around me and pointed to things, completely random and unrelated thing for the French kids, as I read.

When we finished, Marie said to me "il va falloir trouver un nouveau lieu pour storytime." Not yet a victim of its own success, but it's coming.

After we left the library, we invaded the local park. It was like an anglo invasion of Wazemmes with all that English chatter going on.

Stay tuned for September dates. We'll be testing Saturday too!

Here's a picture of part of the group post-storytime but pre-park (mine are the girl in grey showing her claws and covering her face with her hair and the little one in the turquoise stroller). For anyone who remembers the boy, he's the blondie in front. His sister is teh blondie girl next to Max and she's my God-daughter.

Storytime: June edition

Thanks to clairmaria for reminding me to remind you...

The June edition of stoytime will take place on June 22nd at 3:30 pm at the Wazemmes library. Marie (the librarian) and I have already prepared our set list which includes colors, animal sounds and songs!

And moegood news! Storytime already has dates in September and October. We'll be testing Wednesday and a new Saturday session to see what works best.

Be there or be square!

April Storytime: a blessing

I was wondering if my storytime was maudit (or cursed) because 2 days before storytime, the head librarian called me to tell me that Emilie - the librarian who I was supposed to do storytime with - had changed services and she wasn't sure who would be my french speaking counterpart. Since I couldn't come meet with the librarians beforehand, I gave her the idiot's guide to storytime.

When my brood and I arrived for storytime, there were already some familiar faces waiting for us. In fact, all of the faces were familiar since they were all part of my following ie people who I know or who I've personally invited. I was really glad to see Rachael and her two boys (she's a faithful reader). Just as we were about to begin storytime, a woman and her young son walked in. I didn't know them. Yay! I'll take that as a sign of success. In fact, storytime was published in the official Lille library agenda which means that anyone who cared to pick it up at any one of the branch libraries in Lille would have seen storytime on the dochet. Once again, there was a librarian from another branch present as an observer.

Marie - my new counterpart - and I took about 45 seconds to go through the plan and then started. We begin with the welcome song, followed by two bilingual books where she read the FRench and I read the English : Ma Cousine Dit Hello and a bilingual tale from a kid's magazine called Tralalire. We then read Bark George (Aboies George) by Jules Feiffer and I Like Books (J'aime les Livres) by Anthony Brown. A round of Head and Shoulders was thrown in there as well.

The kids seemed happy! The bilingual format worked well. I read a page in English followed by Marie who read the same page in French. It worked well because the books were short. But if we'd chosen longer books, I would have opted for an alternating style where I read one page and then she read the next page in French.

Even Suzanne best friend (the one who wanted me to read in French last time) was interested. I realized that the reason the library hasn't been pushy about it is because they are very excited about storytime but don't want to ask too much of me. Au contraire, ask ask! So, instead of storytime being cursed, I think it's blessed.

The next storytime is scheduled for May 18th at 3:30 PM. There is also a date in June. More dates to come...

Storytime : April edition

The April edition of the bilingual storytime is next week, Wednesday April 13th at 3:30PM. It's at the Médiathèque de Wazemmes, next to the Mairie du Quartier. I think the library is actually asking people to sign up, but you can also just let me know if you plan on coming.

See you there!

Storytime part 1

The day before the first ever bilingual storytime at the Wazemmes library, I walked in and was warmly greeted by one of the head librarians. "You're the woman who's doing the lecture tomorrow, right? We've been trying to get in touch with you..." *roll forboding music*

Emilie, the children's librarian who was supposed to be my French counterpart at storytime, was out with her sick daughter and they weren't sure if she'd be back for storytime. Elise, the head librarian, asked if I still wanted to do it. I instantly answered of course! without really testing the waters. She seemed pleased that I didn't back out because she said she was scared that if we cancelled the first one, then it would jeopardize the next one. The reason they asked if they should cancel is because they didn't have anyone signed up. I told them that, oops, it was my fault because I had at least 5 kids coming and I'd sent an email out to Suzanne's entire school through the PTA.

Admittedly, I started to get a little nervous because of so many unknowns...but hey, little kids aren't scary, right? Haha...

So just before storytime, my friend M and I brought the kids to the park and let them burn off energy (ie I was scared Max would be a terror and needed him to get the crazy out before being confined for 30 minutes).

At 3:20, I showed up to the library with my brood of 4 bilingual kids and my English Mum friend and was pleased to see some other anglo friends waiting for us. Elise introduced me to a man who is the librarian in charge of going into schools in Lille. They asked if it was ok to sit and watch. They also informed me that I was on my own. The storytime room was packed with about a dozen kids, pretty much equally split between bilinguals and Frenchies (and their parents of course).

We began with a welcome song my mother had taught both me and Suzanne. Then I took out my personal English language copies of the books we had planned on reading. I started with The Very Hungry Caterpillar, which I read slowly but not too slowly including many pregnant pauses and hand gestures hoping the kids would fill in the blanks. Two and a half year old Albert chimed in which was great.

When I finished, Max began screaming "encore encore" (and trust me, Max screams) as he handed me Brown Bear, Brown Bear, which I told him to read by himself. I moved onto Little Blue and Little Yellow, followed by Brown Bear upon Max's requested, was briefly interupted by Suzanne who came to tell me her friends asked if I could read in French because they didn't understand English, and then a little boy from Suzanne's class who called out that English was nul and finished with Where the Wildthings Are before wrapping it all up with a round of "Head Shoulders Knees and Toes". All the kids got a coloring page of Eric Carle's caterpillar (which probably ended up in the garbage since I'm not sure what my conscientious, art loving daughter did with hers!).

The reading was animated by Max pushing his copy of Brown Bear upon anyone who seemed remotely interested and finishing off each story with a hearty round of "Mommy, encore".

I THINK it went well. I got positive feedback from my friends as well as from the non-English speakers there. When I asked one friend how it compared to the british cultural center, his reply was that it was more or less the same but they were "professional" which I'm not sure how to take. Elise seemed pleased and said she thought the bilingual format would work really well, since the kids hung on in English for the first couple books. With some French mixed in, it would keep them hanging on.

The next storytime is on Wednesday, April 13th at 3:30 PM. Be there or be square.

The Grandma conundrum

I am a worrier. It's part of who I am and what makes me both lovable and annoying as hell.

And although I come off as being pretty low-key, calm and collected, I'm not. I spend most days with the feeling that all of my organs have low-frequency waves going through them making me constantly tremble.

The point is, that at this stage, I shouldn't be so worried about Max's language progression. But I am. Suzanne is bilingual. Max is saying more and more every day, much of it in English, and he clearly understands everything. But, I do worry which is why it's so important for Max to get the most out of my mother's annual February visit.

When Suzanne was Max's age, she spent 2 weeks with my mother every February. Max can't do that because my mother can't really handle both kids for 2 weeks during vacation. So as February vacation approaches (my mom arrives in 17 days!), I'm trying to come up with creative and realistic solutions for Max to get the most out of my Mom without 1)totally draining my Mom and 2)without putting anyone at risk. My mother had back surgery a couple years ago and isn't completely stable on her feet which makes carrying an energetic 18 month old boy up and down the stairs a little complicated. I may be able to take a couple days off work to help out, but it isn't the same as 2 weeks with Grandma!

I want them to bond the way Suzanne and Grandma have in the past. And I want Max to drown in an American bath (so to speak). I was thinking that maybe Max could go to nursery school in the mornings - since he sleeps anyway - and my mom could get him after lunch a couple times. That way they get to spend a few half days together which is better than no days at all.

And let's face it. Grandmas are just awesome. They spoil us, make good food and when Grandma's visiting, the kitchen sink is always empty of dirty dishes.

So if anyone out there has some ideas (on how to relax or how to maximize Grandma's stay), please share.

The birth of American (English language) storytime

While talking to my friend M, I had an ephiphany....
Why pay 4€ per storytime session at the British Cultural Centre when we can do it ourselves for free? I thought long and hard about how to handle it and then it came to me. Me, the daughter of the librarian.

Last week, I walked into the Wazemmes branch of the Lille public library and told them I'd like to organize English story time and would they be interested. The director was rather reserved but after talking to her, I could tell she was delighted.

Rather than organizing a seperate English storytime, she would prefer to piggyback English storytime onto the regular storytime which currently takes place the first Wednesday and Sunday of the month. She explained her logic : they are already have enough trouble attracting participants to French storytime so she would like people to get used to the storytime idea.

When I get back from the US in November, I will meet with the library and the regular story tellers to see how we can organize a bilingual storytime. I already have tons of ideas of course. We can do a bilingual reading. We can use multimedia. We can use puppets. The world is mine! Oh wait, I'm getting carried away here...

Stay tuned for more information on English-American storytime in Lille (I hope that's obvious enough to get hits).