Welcome to Our Newsletter!

Some of you who receive this are members of our Friends of the Library (FOL) and already receive a quarterly newsletter in the mail. The FOL newsletter is a report about current library events, new services, changes in staff, and Friends of the Library activities.

This newsletter is different – while it will include information about programs and events, we are also going to include information about things we think might interest you. Sometimes we may highlight something in our collection. Sometimes we may tell you about some really handy websites. And we will always have some book reviews – after all, books are still a major part of our service and we KNOW there are readers still lurking out there!

If you’ve received this newsletter and do not want to continue to receive it, or if this was forwarded to you by a friend and you’d like to be on our email list, please let us know by sending a message to kptlib@wrlibrary.org. We plan on sending this quarterly. And don’t forget to visit our website www.kingsportlibrary.org.

Special Summer Programs for Kids, Teens and Adults

For Kids

The theme for the children’s programs is “Rompin’ Stompin’ Reading Roundup!” It will run from June 5 through July 27 and registration begins anytime after May 29.

Programs for 2 and 3 years olds will be on Thursdays at 10:00.

Tuesday, July 17: 10:30: Funfest Sidewalk Chalk Event for all ages!

Programs for 3-5 year olds will be on Tuesdays at 10:30.

Tuesday, July 17: 10:30: Funfest Sidewalk Chalk Event for all ages

Programs for K-5 students will be on Wednesdays at various times:

June 6: 11:00 & 2:30: The Singing Cowboy.
June 13: 2:30: Jeff Robbins – stories, dancing and music.
June 20: 11:00 & 2:30: Safari Greg as the Reading Ranger – with live varmints
July 11: 2:30: Magician Matt Fore
Tuesday, July 17: 10:30: Funfest Sidewalk Chalk Event for all ages!
July 25: 2:30 Calamity Jane storyteller
July 27: 2:30: Jonesborough Novelty Band

Certificates, door prizes and refreshments will be held at the final program of each age group.

For Magic Tree House Fans:

Participate in a Magic Tree House Book Club where you’ll learn the facts behind the book, create a theme craft and eat unique refreshments.

Thursday, June 7: 11:00: #9: Dolphins at Daybreak
Thursday, June 14: 11:00: #10: Ghost Town at Sundown
Thursday, June 21: 11:00: #12: Polar Bears Past Bedtime

For Teens: age 12 (or entering 6th grade) to 18:

The theme for the Teen Summer Reading Program is “Find Your Space @ the Library.” Door prizes will be given away at each program. Also, you may register at each program to win an I-Pod Shuffle and I-Tune cards. Every book you read will allow you to enter your name in a weekly drawing.

Saturday, June 9 from 1:00 until 3:00: Join us at Barnes & Noble in Johnson City for a scavenger hunt.

Thursday, June 14 @ 3:00: Decorate Your Space: Interior Decorator, Robin May, will present a program on designing/decorating your own space. Please pre-register – supplies provided.

Thursday, June 21 @ 3:00: A Face for Your Space: Portraiture program led by artist Rebecca Reynolds. Please pre-register – supplies provided.

Tuesday, June 26 @ 3:00: Middle School Book Club: “A View From Saturday” by E.L Konisburg. Please pre-register – refreshments will be provided.

Thursday, June 28 @ 3:00: High School Book Club: “The Day They Came to Arrest the Book,” by Nat Hentoff. Please pre-register – refreshments will be provided.

Tuesday, July 10 @ 3:00: Board, Not Bored: Pizza and Games! Bring your favorite game to play. Even if you don’t own any games, come anyway. Games will be available – including DDR.

Thursday, July 19 @ 3:00:
Harry Potter Program: Movie Showing, free food and 2 drawings for new book released July 21.

Adults

The Kingsport Public Library is having its first-ever adult summer reading program – why should kids have all the fun?

Participation in our adult summer reading program couldn’t be easier. Register at the library. Read or listen to- (if you’re an audio book fan) one of Kingsport Public Library’s books/audio book, or your own, between June 4 and July 27. For each book you read or listen to, you can fill out a brief review form and put the review in the special prize box for a weekly drawing. The more you read/listen to, the more chances you’ll have to win a prize (only one prize per family).

Prizes include: a round of golf for a foursome from Ridgefields Country Club, tickets for two for the Barter Theatre, Sunday brunch for two at Martha Washington Inn, tickets for two for the Symphony of the Mountains (2 each week) and a book from Barnes & Noble (one book each week).

So sign up and join the fun!! Book reviews will be posted on our website and you can see what others think about what they’re reading this summer.

July 14 from 10:00 a.m. until noon in the Mead Auditorium: Fun Fest Genealogy workshop, “Picture your Family History: The East Tennessee and Southwest Virginia Digital Archives Collection.” Please pre-register by calling 224-2539 or dropping by the reference department.

Noteworthy News

Our online catalog now contains not only the catalogs of  all the public libraries in the Watauga Regional Library System - Carter County, Unicoi County, Greene County, Johnson County, Sullivan County (including Kingsport Public Library), and Washington County (including Johnson City Public Library), but the really BIG news is our online catalog now includes the holdings of the Bristol Public Library, East Tennessee State University Library, the Quillen Medical Library and Northeast State Tech Library. The courier service has been expanded to include these locations – so if you need a book they have at ETSU, you can place the hold request and a courier will bring that book to the Kingsport Public Library and we’ll give you a call to pick it up. You will now have over 1.8 MILLION library items available to you through our online catalog consortia and courier system – the ONLY one like this in the state. Just one more reason it’s good to live in East Tennessee.

The catalog has also changed in appearance and functionality. When you go to the catalog now, you’ll see a more “amazon-like” webpage. And you can still search all the libraries at one time, or only the Kingsport Public Library. If you search the Kingsport Public Library, you can search all of our collection at one time, or search only our children’s collection, genealogy collection or archives collection.

Librarian Lowdown:

by Karen Cassell

If you’ve seen one search engine, you’ve seen them all…not

Searching Designed for Kids

www.kidsclick.com
Kids Click is a web search engine designed for kids by librarians and has been rated by Technology and Learning Magazine as one of the best search tools for younger students.

kids.yahoo.com
This is a beta search engine. It has lots of advertising but is a fun search site for kids. Once you use the search feature most of the ads disappear and excellent search results are retrieved.

www.onekey.com or www.safekids.com
These are kid-safe search engines powered by Google. These are very simple search engines that do not include lots of graphics and advertising.

www.ask.com or www.askforkids.com
Ask.com has been rated by Technology and Learning Magazine as one of the best search tools for younger students. Students can phrase their search in natural language by asking a question.

Search Tools for Adults

www.google.com
Google is one of the most popular search engines. Advertising is kept to a minimum and is easily identified. Google has a lot of extras, such as image, video and blog searches. You can also search inside of books with book search. Be sure and check out MORE on the Google tool bar to see all of Google’s search tools.

www.ask.com
This site used to be AskJeeves. It has improved and like Google keeps its ads to a minimum. Results include good cross references to help refine searches. This site also will search blogs, online communities and social networks.

www.dogpile.com
This is a metasearch engine that searches Google, Yahoo search, MSN, and Ask plus a few more search engines all at the same time.

lii.org
Librarians Index to the Internet is a subject directory that has over 20,000 entries maintained by librarians that are organized into fourteen main topics and approximately 300 related topics.

clusty.com
Clusty searches several top search engines and generates a list that groups search engine results into clusters instead of one long list. This way you can search results by subtopic and see relationships between relevant items.

www.a9.com
This site helps you find products. It allows you to search for certain products or browse product categories from Amazon sites worldwide.

www.infobel.com and www.switchboard.com
Useful telephone directories on the web for both yellow and white pages. Infobel includes other countries as well as the United States. You can also do reverse lookups using the phone numbers.

bubl.ac.uk
This search catalogue includes selected Internet resources covering all academic subject areas.