September is National Library Card Sign-up Month! If you don’t have a card already, now is a great time to get one. In celebration, we’re starting a great new program this month – “Every Child Ready to Read.” This program is designed to educate parents and caregivers on the skills they can use at home to help prepare children for success in school. The five simple skills in “ECR2R” —-talking, singing, reading, writing, and playing—are familiar and easy to use as parents integrate them into everyday life, using books and literature with their children. It has been demonstrated that by using these simple practices, children develop early literacy skills that will make them successful readers. Children’s Librarians around Wake County will incorporate these easy skills into each library program for young children. Check out our expanded Storytime schedule in this article!

Main Display

You don’t have to go far to learn new and amazing things – just open your back door to “Your Backyard Safari.”

Easy Books (E)

• An Egg Is Quiet by Dianna Aston

From tiny hummingbird eggs to giant ostrich eggs, oval ladybug eggs to tubular dogfish eggs, gooey frog eggs to fossilized dinosaur eggs, this book introduces children to more than 60 types of eggs and an interesting array of egg facts.

• Pest Fest by Julia Durango

All kinds of insects compete to see who is the best pest, but despite the long legs of the spider and beauty of the ladybug, a common housefly demonstrates in his own special way why he should win.

• Bat’s Big Game by Margaret Read MacDonald

A simplified retelling of the classic Aesop’s fable about a ball game between the birds and the animals, and Bat, who wants to play on the winning team.

Juvenile Fiction

• Children of Summer by Margaret J. Anderson

Ten-year-old Paul describes how he and his sisters learned about insects from the observations and writings of their father, the nineteenth-century French entomologist Jean-Henri Fabre.

• Harry the Poisonous Centipede’s Big Advenure by Lynne Reid Banks

Harry, a young centipede, faces danger and frustration when he is captured by a hoo-min and placed in a jar.

• The Keeper of the Doves by Betsy Byers

In the late 1800s in Kentucky, Amie McBee and her four sisters both fear and torment the reclusive and seemingly sinister Mr. Tominski, but their father continues to provide for his needs.

Juvenile Non-Fiction

• Snakes! By Melissa Stewart (J597.96 STEWA)

This book provides an introduction to the types, physical features, behavior, and pet potential of snakes.

• The Frog Scientist by Pamela Turner (J597.8 TURNE)

Tyrone Hayes works to discover the effects pesticides have on frogs and, in turn, us.

• Bateman’s Backyard Birds by Robert Bateman (J598 BATEMAN)

The more than 65 color illustrations, supplemented with simple, direct text and interesting sidebars, make this book the perfect introduction to birding for nature lovers of all ages.

What’s new in adult audio books

Sometimes you just need a hero to save the day…

• Zero Day by David Baldacci
• Fatal Error by J.A. Jance
• Potboiler by Jesse Kellerman
• Celebrity in Death by J..D.Robb
• DC Dead by Stuart Woods

YOUTH PROGRAMS – Toddlers, Preschool, School Age and Teens

We’re excited! We have an expanded Storytime schedule and it begins on September 4! Join us this month for the start of a new series of kids’ programs.

Storytime – September 4 – November 30

Baby Storytime

• 20 minute lap time program for moms and babies
• Wednesdays at 10 a.m. throughout September

Toddler Storytime

• For Toddlers ages 1-3
• Wednesdays and Thursdays at 10:30 a.m. throughout September

Preschool Storytime

• Ø For Preschoolers ages 3-5
• Ø Wednesdays and Thursdays at 11:30 a.m. throughout September

Family Storytime

• For Preschoolers ages 3-5, Tuesdays at 6:30 p.m. throughout September

Homeschool/Trackout

Amazing Weather with Mike Moss: learn all about hurricanes and other exciting weather events.

• Tuesday, September 18 at 1 p.m.

School Age Adventures

Scaredy Squirrel: Squirrel stories and fun facts – plus a craft!

• Thursday, September 20 at 4:30 p.m.

Teen Program

Read to Win! NC State Fair Teen Reading Challenge

• You can win 2 State Fair all day passes.
• Pick up a reading log at the library starting September 1. Keep track of how much time you spend reading and enter it on the log. You receive 1 entry ticket for every hour you record on your log.
• All logs must be turned in to the library by October 1, 2012 to receive tickets that will be entered in the prize drawing.

Youth main display

We’re partnering with Motheread and the News and Observer’s Newspapers in Education Division to promote International Literacy Day on Saturday, September 8, 2012. Stop by the library and “Get Caught Reading a Favorite Book.”

Easy Books (E)

• Fancy Nancy and the Mermaid Ballet by Jane O’Connor

Nancy makes the best of not dancing the lead in her ballet school’s Deep Sea Dances show, but becomes jealous when her best friend gets a better role than hers.

• Secret Agent Splat! by Rob Scotton

Splat notices that his favorite wooden ducks keep going missing—can Secret Agent Splat solve the mystery?

• The Duckling Gets a Cookie!? by Mo Willems

Pigeon is very angry when the duckling gets a cookie just by asking politely.