The 2nd International Congress took place at the Russian State Library for Young Adults in October 2011. It has gathered more than 200 participants from Russia, Belarus, Ukraine, Kazakhstan, Vietnam, Lithuania, Finland and Sweden. The participants have discussed actual problems of library service and effective ways to improve young people’s attention to library as a centre of intellectual and personal development. Besides traditional report sessions, polemic and thematic meetings, there were less formal, memorable events at the Congress.  Read more

The Young Adult Library Services Association (YALSA), a division of the American Library Association (ALA), announced its 2012 list of Popular Paperbacks for Young Adults (PPYA).

The list, drawn from 219 official nominations, is presented annually at the ALA Midwinter Meeting. The complete list of 99 titles, including annotations, can be found at www.ala.org/yalsa/booklists/poppaper.

Using a variety of drama and visual arts programmes, young people from many areas of Dublin City will work with professional artists and writers to explore the question ‘Graffiti – Art or Vandalism?’.

This programme of activities, presented by Dublin City Public Libraries, is aimed at educating children, whilst encouraging them to comment creatively on the social conditions in which they find themselves.

Seventeen libraries will continue to participate in this ambitious public programme throughout the Spring of 2012, using a broad range of learning strategies to deliver this very important message.

Programmes which were completed in December 2011 include:

• Two visual arts programmes, Meeting Point and the creation of a mural on a library wall
• A drama programme, Creating Creative Communities – Mantle of the Expert
• Anti-graffiti workshops from Graffiti Wipeout

Rudy by Margaret Callan-Bergin will be both lively and fun and also deliver deliver an educational message; concentrating on the consequences of our actions and how our behaviour can affect those around us.

• Ballymun Library – Tuesday 31st January
• Charleville Mall Library – Wednesday 1st February
• Walkinstown Library – Thursday 2nd February
• Central Library – Friday 3rd February
• Pearse St. Library – Monday 6th February
• Ballyfermot Library – Tuesday 7th February
• Coolock Library – Wednesday 8th February
• Cabra Library – Thursday 9th February
• Rathmines Library – Friday 10th February

Film maker Killian Waters will document the project on behalf of Dublin City Public Libraries.

The Graffiti – Art or Vandalism? programme was made possible by funding from a bequest made to Dublin City Council.

Adolescence 2: hormonised poems is a collection of alternative love poems by Andalusian poet Manuel Arana. Taking inspiration from a range of contemporary and historical sources, his poems invite the reader into a playful conversation on the subject of love and all its subsets: friendship, doubt, metaphysics, tolerance, romance, excess, torment, truth, insomnia and waking revelation.

Supported by the EACEA (Education, Audiovisual & Culture Executive Agency), this translation brings Arana’s striking debut collection to a whole new audience around Europe and the USA.

‘Manuel Arana has a way with words, the timely spark, the unexpected twist, the memorable conclusion’. Juan Antonio González Romano, Professor of Spanish Language and Literature and Director of Studies IES Caura (Coria del Río, Sevilla)

Launch will take place at: Instituto Cervantes,  Lincoln House, Lincoln Place, Dublin 2. Time: 1.00p.m. Monday 23rd January 2012

‘It’s not the past that matters, it’s the way you see it’: Childhood, Ireland, and Children’s Fiction

The National Library of Ireland is hosting a lecture series in conjunction with their photographic exhibition Small Lives – Photographs of Irish Childhood 1880 – 1970

The first lecture is in February and focuses on Irish history as portrayed in children’s fiction

Lecturer: Dr Pádraic Whyte, Assistant Professor of English, Trinity College Dublin.

Dr Pádraic Whyte will discuss the representation of Irish history and childhood as portrayed in children’s fiction. Dr Pádraic Whyte is Assistant Professor of English at Trinity College Dublin and author of Irish Childhoods: Children’s Fiction and Irish History

Venue: National Library of Ireland, Kildare St, Dublin 2

This event is free and no booking is required.

Exhibition: Small Lives – Photographs of Irish Childhood 1880 – 1970

The National Photographic Archive’s current exhibition explores photographs of Irish children from 1880 to 1970. The photographs are from the National Library of Ireland’s photographic collection and show a wide range of photographs from formal studio shots, images of school children and photographs of city life in the 1960s. The exhibition will run until June 2012 and takes place in the National Library’s Photographic Archive, Meeting House Sq, Temple Bar, Dublin 2.

To celebrate the Chinese New Year 2012, the Year of the Dragon, join Dublin City Public Libraries for the following events:

• Dragon Stories and Dance
• Chinese stories and new year crafts
• Chinese New Year arts and crafts

As part of South Dublin County Library’s YAPS  - Dive In! Totally Teen Festival,  graphic artist Maeve Clancy ran a one day workshop on all aspects of graphic art.  This proved very popular with the participants.  View some of the work produced on the day here.  Well done to everybody who took part.

Vote for your favourite library in Children’s Books Ireland’s ‘Library of the Month’ competition.

Last November CBI chose Clondalkin as an ‘interesting library’ and now they’re turning what was an occasional series into a Library of the Month competition.

You can nominate your local or favourite Irish public library by ‘liking’ the CBI Facebook page, sharing a photo of the library in question and telling CBI why it’s so special.

Visit the CBI Facebook page for more information.

The latest  U.S. national ambassador for young people’s literature has been named as Walter Dean Myers. Mr. Myers, an African-American man who dropped out of high school but built a successful writing career — largely because of his lifelong devotion to books —  said his message to young people would be etched by his own experiences.

Mr. Myers is the third person to be appointed to the post, which was created in 2008 and is chosen by a committee formed by two groups: the Center for the Book in the Library of Congress and Every Child a Reader, a nonprofit organization affiliated with the Children’s Book Council, a trade association for children’s book publishers. He succeeds Katherine Paterson, the novelist best known for her “Bridge to Terabithia,” and the first appointee, Jon Scieszka, author of books including “The Stinky Cheese Man and Other Fairly Stupid Tales.” Further details

Using nursery rhymes as a stimulus for art making and puppetry, five or six parent/child pairings worked together through a unique process which aimed to build children’s confidence in directing their own learning and to support their development.

Kids’ Own is conducting research alongside this project, in partnership with the UNESCO Centre at the University of Ulster, to investigate the impact of this work on child development. Ongoing feedback from parents, librarians and childcare workers, as well as a full evaluation among the partners, have fed into this pilot research, which we hope can be extended into future family learning projects.