I got to shadow Emily at the Beaumont Community Center for her storytime program, and wow—she's really good at what she does. I went in thinking I'd just observe, but I ended up taking a ton of notes because there was so much to learn from watching her work.
The way she started was genius. She came out with puppets and immediately started being goofy and silly with the kids. No formal "okay everyone sit down and be quiet" energy, just pure fun right from the jump.
Once everyone was warmed up and engaged, she read them a story. I was honestly surprised by how well-behaved they were, usually kids that age can be all over the place, but they sat there listening, participating, genuinely into it. Emily knew exactly how to read to them too, changing her voice, asking them questions, making it interactive rather than just reading words on a page.
After the story, things got loud in the best way. She put on music and had all the kids form a line to dance and follow her around the room. It was adorable chaos, kids laughing, dancing, having the time of their lives. But it was also smart programming because it gave them a chance to move around and burn off that energy instead of expecting them to sit still the whole time.
The session wrapped up with coloring, which lasted about thirty minutes. This gave the kids something calmer to do and gave them something to take home, which they seemed really excited about. Meanwhile, the parents got to chat with each other and with Emily, which I realized is probably just as important as the kids' programming, building those community connections.
I left feeling like I'd learned so much just from watching Emily work. She made it look effortless, but there was clearly a lot of intentional planning and skill behind what she was doing. The pacing, the variety of activities, knowing when to be high-energy and when to bring it down, it all mattered.
The 2nd half of the day was weeding books for the juvenile history section. These sections have not been weeded in a year or two so it is taking a considerable amount of time.
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