|
|
|
April 8, 2020
|
|
|
Reminder: STEAM Ahead @ Home Survey
In order to provide the most effective online resources for this newsletter, we have created a short survey to collect input on how your library is currently functioning and what your needs might be. Additionally, we are using this opportunity to connect libraries and their patrons to NASA Solar Ambassadors and Night Sky Network members for virtual programs.
If you haven't completed our survey, please taking a few moments so we can determine how to best serve your library and its community during this unprecedented time.
Thank you!
| |
Upcoming Webinar: Bringing the Stories of the Skies to Your Library
Note: Although we have reached capacity for our normal Zoom registration, this webinar will be live-streamed on our YouTube Channel and recorded for viewing at a later time.
Thursday, April 9 at 3:00 p.m. (ET), 2:00 p.m. (CT),1:00 p.m. (MT), 12:00 p.m. (PT)
Join STAR Net, Christine Shupla (Lunar and Planetary Institute), and Elizabeth Nicolai (Anchorage Public Library) for this 1-hour webinar that will help you connect constellation legends and myths into your programs by learning about the stories – both fact and fiction! – of specific astronomical objects, constellations, and planetary bodies. View more details >>
| |
Virtual Programs
Use this featured resource to add easy, hands-on STEAM activities (using common household materials) to your online Story Time programs. Note: Book recommendations are included.
| |
| Virtual Program: SciGirls Star Power
In this maker activity, participants use a shoe box, constellation template, and flashlight to shine a star pattern on a wall. An additional maker project demonstrates the importance of reducing light pollution.
| |
Families at Home
Below is a set of resources that can be provided directly to families without the need of facilitation by library staff.
| |
| Hands-on Activity: Drawing Nature
Practice your artistic skills to help communicate your observations of a plant, insect, or animal.
Before cameras were invented or easy to use, drawing was a huge part of documenting nature. Some scientists were amazing artists too, or they would hire local artists to draw the animals and plants they discovered
| |
| Build at Home: Make Life Easier with Your Own Zipline!
Forgot something from upstairs? Need to pass the salt? Bridges are one way of moving across a gap. Zip lines are another! Create a zipline to transport small items from here to there.
| |
| How-to Video: Loony Lunar Phases
In this hands-on STEAM activity, patrons hear a story, song, or (silly or serious) poem that celebrates the Moon's different phases. Then, they shape frosting (or spread) on cookies (or crackers) in the shape of the Moon's phases, then place them in position on a calendar.
| |
| Digital App: Planet Families
Build your own solar system. But watch out: even the gravity between planets can pull them out of position. For more about how this computer model works, and some things to try, try this one page handout.ight can take tens of thousands of years to get from the fusion core of a star to its surface. Can you do better? Steer the photon through the maze, collect letters, and build a phrase to help you escape. The game includes twenty seven different mazes corresponding to stars ranging from red dwarfs to blue supergiants!
Available on smartphones and tablets!
| |
Refresh Your Skills
Keep your skills sharp by revisiting these professional development resources.
| |
| Webinar: Grappling with Unconscious Bias
No matter how good our intentions may be, we are all susceptible to forming social stereotypes about certain groups of people outside of our own conscious awareness. The library setting is a place of equitable and inclusive lifelong learning, and by better understanding unconscious bias and the role it plays in our libraries, we can better serve our communities. In this 90 minute webinar, guest presenters from The Avarna Group introduced the framework of unconscious bias to describe some of the challenges that well-intentioned people who are doing good JEDI (justice, equity, diversity, inclusion) work face.
| |
| Find us elsewhere! Click any of the above images to link
to follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Pinterest.
| |
| The STAR Library Network (STAR Net) is a hands-on learning network for libraries and their communities across the country. STAR Net focuses on helping library professionals build their STEM skills by providing “science-technology activities and resources” (STAR) and training to use those resources. Plus, engage public audiences nationwide in informal and lifelong learning with the excitement of exploration and discovery through STAR Net's NASA@ My Library program!
STAR Net is built upon a strong network of collaborators and partners, led by the Space Science Institute’s (SSI) National Center for Interactive Learning (NCIL). Partners include the American Library Association’s Public Programs Office, Collaborative Summer Library Program, Chief officers of State Library Agencies, Lunar and Planetary Institute, Afterschool Alliance, Education Development Center, American Society of Civil Engineers, and Cornerstones of Science. Major funding is provided by the National Science Foundation, NASA Science Mission Directorate, the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation, and the Institute of Museum and Library Services.
| |
|
|
|
|
