Calamity Day Programing

Some of you are preparing out there for Snowmageddon 2015. Maybe you will have so much snow that your library will be closed for the day. In that case I wish you luck, safety and plenty of hot tea and long books to keep you company on your day off.

If not and you are facing a snow day for everyone else except the library, well take comfort. We are both in the same boat.

I'm going to reference back to my post about holiday break planning, because its basically the same thing. Kids are stuck inside and need something to do! It's Monday and I'm sure many parents not wanting to face a now 3 day weekend with their kids cooped up need some place to bring them. I had the weekend off and I still brought my kid to the library just to get us out of the house!

Schools have calamity day plans; so should you! Have some impromptu programs for your patrons on snow days. After a discussion in an email around our staff, we had someone in our department make up several folders with coloring sheets, activities, scavengers hunts, a simple craft and other passive materials to put out.  Maybe today is the day for life size puzzles or board games.

We had passives as well as a movie. If your collection of family movies is large, you're in luck. But if its popular and often checked out you might want to form your own "little library" of popular kids movies your co-workers can bring from home. I brought my Donald Duck binder full of Disney movies today ;)

I got to pick which one and at what time. (Wreck it Ralph) because everything was on the fly. I picked a point in the afternoon when we had a couple of families in the kids area and announced that I would be showing the movie soon and had a couple of kids show up. It gave their parents a much needed break. Also develop an emergency "snack bar". Jugs of punch don't expire quickly and popcorn and Twinkies last for an eternity.

If you made about themes here are a few I cam up with to match with a movie.

Wreck-it-Ralph- Building blocks and/or LEGO play, coloring sheets of video game characters, Pokemon scavenger hunt, Minecraft on the public computers
The Jungle Book- Animals masks
Happy Feet- Some sort of penguin craft (perfect for cold weather)
My Little Pony Movie -(Your Pick) -A Sensory Bin of Rainbow rice.

Stay warm out there fellow "liberrians."