Workforce computers

Do you know someone who needs to use a computer to search for jobs?   To create a resume?  To complete an online job application?  Tell them about the WorkForce computers at the Martinsburg Public Library.

The Workforce computers were given to the library by WorkForce West Virginia a few years ago to expand their services by offering public-access computers to different locations in communities throughout the state. Funding was secured through a BroadbandUSA grant as a result of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009.

These computers are made available to the public solely for the purposes of job-searching and related activities.  Users are granted a longer work session on these computers than on the public-access Internet computers in the computer lab to permit users to complete their tasks.  Users must show a library card or a photo ID like a driver’s license to register to use the WorkForce computers.

The WorkForce computers are located in the reference department on the top floor of the Martinsburg Public Library.  Library personnel are available to facilitate usage and to provide assistance. Announcements of local job listings, open positions at local companies, and community job fairs and opportunities are posted on a bulletin board in the library’s WorkForce computer center.

El Dia de Leer

El Dia de Leer Grant from ALA and Dollar General Store

In the Spring, we will present activities in conjunction with El Dia de Leer, with partial funding provided by ALA and the Dollar General Store. One of the signature programs will include a visit from Hispanic Author / Illustrator Lulu Delacre. In addition to literature she will lead dances and songs from the Hispanic cultures. 

We will be investigating the local environment (both terrestrial and atmospheric)  with the GLOBE project from the NASA facility in Fairmont.

How to Type!

Ever since I started helping people with computers, both in Martinsburg and Rockville, I have had the question, “Treena, how do you type so quickly?”

In all honesty, I don’t think I type quickly at all with a 50 words a minute average that is slowed from being unused to the computer lab keyboards. This is especially in comparison to my grandmother who was a professional secretary once upon a time and could type an average of 65 words a minute on an old stiff typewriter with high keys and somehow keep a perfect manicure apparently.

While I can’t teach you to be the “Do it all” perfectionist my grandmother is, I can give a few tricks of the trade to increase typing speed.

First, the pointer fingers are positioned in resting position at “F” and “J”

Second, the thumbs should be above the “space bar”, but normally only the thumb of the dominant hand is used.

Third, between words, fingers should hover above the keys instead of resting on them; this will decrease mistakes from “heavy handedness.”

Lastly, if imputing in an abundance of numbers, make sure the numb lock is ON for the right hand number pad. It’s significantly quicker to type into than the row of numbers at the top. 

Legos @ Martinsburg Public Library

Leg Godt=Play Well

If the phrase above resembles a familiar word, you’re on the right track. ‘Leg Godt’ is a Danish phrase meaning ‘play well’, and was the motto of a man named Ole Kirk Kristiansen, master carpenter and joiner, and founder of The Lego Group. In 1934, the Kristiansens simply abbreviated ‘leg godt’ to ‘LEGO’. (Interestingly, the family later realized that in Latin ‘lego’ means ‘I put together’!) Because the Kristiansens were carpenters, the original Lego bricks were wooden; even though they are plastic now, the Lego brick is still their most important product. But look where Lego has gone! Team-ups with Star Wars, Batman, Indian Jones, The Hobbit, Harry Potter, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, not to mention Ninjago, Lego Friends, Chima, and more. More than just building for play, The Lego Group has lent its name to video games, movies, story books, and building idea books. Legos were a popular toy decades ago, and continue to be so and even more so today! Find out more about LEGO history at wwwsecure.lego.com/en-US/aboutus/lego-group/the_lego_history

Enjoy LEGO free-play after school, every 1st and 3rd Monday from 3:30pm–4pm in the Martinsburg Children’s Library.

Will Eisner Week

WILL EISNER WEEK March 1st  – 7th 2015

Will Eisner is a pioneer in the comic industry, known in professional circles not as ‘comics’ but as ‘sequential art’. Beginning his career in the 1930s, Eisner authored, illustrated, and produced great graphic novels when the genre was in its infancy. Eisner also taught cartooning at the School of Visual Arts in New York, forging the talent of many of today's graphic novelists and industry professionals. Every year at Comic Con International, outstanding graphic novels of the year are selected for the Eisner Award, considered the Oscar of the comic world and honoring the “Father of the Graphic Novel”, Will Eisner.

Join us Thursday, March 5th, at 6pm for an informal discussion about graphic novels. Bring your own, or peruse our shelves – we’ll have many out on display.

At 6:30 we’ll show The Spirit, based on Eisner’s comic of the same name, from the director of Sin City, co-written by the comic mogul Frank Miller, and starring Gabriel Macht, Samuel L Jackson, and Scarlett Johannson.

(Rated PG-13, 103 minutes)

 

Will Eisner Week is an annual celebration in March promoting graphic novel literacy, sequential art, free speech awareness, and the legacy of Will Eisner.

Follow the links below to find out more about Will Eisner and the Eisner Awards. http://www.willeisner.com/

http://www.comic-con.org/awards/eisner-awards-current-info

CHILDREN'S AUTHORS AND ILLUSTRATORS WEEK

CHILDREN'S AUTHORS AND ILLUSTRATORS WEEK: A report from Musselman The first week in February, the Children's Author Network (www.childrensauthorsnetwork.com), or CAN!, sponsors Children's Authors and Illustrators Week. At the Musselman Library, we have been celebrating!

All month our display case showcases some favorite children's authors and illustrators.

CAIW is over, but that doesn't mean your family has to stop celebrating your favorite authors and illustrators! The best way to celebrate them is to keep enjoying their books. If we don't have a book you want, let us know! We have some other ways of helping you find a book we don't have on the shelf. If you have an e-reader or tablet, you can download a variety of children's titles through our website. If another public library in the tri-county owns the book, we will have it sent to your home branch via courier. Through the interlibrary loan service, you can often borrow a book that's not in our system from another library in the region. We also consider patron requests when purchasing new materials.

Library programs also help you celebrate beloved books and discover new favorites. Story time is a wonderful way for kids and caretakers to enjoy newer picture books as well as classics together. For older kids (8-12), we offer a discussion group, Chapter Book Chatter, which gives them a forum for expressing their thoughts on popular and classic children's novels.

We love children's books, and we know your family does, too. Next time you're in, ask us how you can celebrate the authors and illustrators you love!

Visit Eleanor Roosevelt at North Berkeley Library on March 31st

Visit with Eleanor!

Some things that may surprise you about Eleanor Roosevelt:

11)      Her Uncle Teddy walked her down the aisle at her wedding to FDR.  Both of her parents had died by the time she was 11 years old.

22)      Her given name was Anna Eleanor Roosevelt. She preferred Eleanor to Anna.

33)      She once flew with Amelia Earhart.

44)      She wrote a syndicated column for the newspaper entitled “My Day” expressing her political views and relating stories from her personal life.

55)      She starred in several commercials including this margarine commercial from 1959.
Click here to view the video.

66)      Her son, Elliott, was the author of 14 books including mysteries in which his mother was cast as the sleuth.

77)      She received 35 honorary degrees, four more than FDR.

To “meet” Eleanor Roosevelt, join us at 6:00 pm on March 31 at the North Berkeley Library. Patty Cooper, from History Alive! will be portraying Eleanor Roosevelt.  She will give an interactive performance and then answer questions as First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt.

History Alive!, is a program offered by the West Virginia Humanities Council which “brings historical characters to life through portrayals by presenters who have conducted scholarly research on their character”.

Local History and Genealogy resources

Learn more about our local community’s history and your own family’s history at the Martinsburg Public Library:

The C.E. Campbell Beall Room (local history and genealogy research room) contains print materials related to history and genealogy in the region including Berkeley, Jefferson, Morgan, and Hampshire Counties in West Virginia, Frederick and Washington Counties in Maryland, and the City of Winchester, Frederick, Loudoun, and Clarke Counties and the Shenandoah Valley in Virginia, including many birth, death, and marriage records, cemetery records, tax and census records, deeds and land records, old Martinsburg city directories, and obituary indexes.     A photocopier machine in the reference department enables users to make copies at the cost of 10 cents per copy.

The Microfilm Collection includes newspapers of Berkeley, Jefferson, and Morgan Counties in West Virginia from 1791 to present. Copies may be printed from a microfilm reader at the cost of 10 cents per copy or page images may be transferred onto your own USB drive at no cost.

Research databases available to library users include:

Ancestry.com (a subscription database which may be used in the research room in the main library and branch libraries in the county); 

HeritageQuest Online (a subscription database which may be used in the library or from home); and West Virginia Vital Research Records (a database of birth, death, and marriage records and actual record images available through the West Virginia Division of Culture and History).

And a knowledgeable library staff can help to direct researchers and provide family research files on different local families.

Submitted by Keith Hammersla

What's new--Ancestry.com

Find Your Past at the Library Today

The Martinsburg Berkeley County Public Library has several tools for assisting you in researching your family history. These include Ancestry.com, Biography and Genealogy Master Index, Genealogy Bank, Heritage Quest and others. Some can be used from home by getting a password from the library. Others must be accessed from the library computers. In this BLOG I will provide an introduction to Ancestry.com.

Access to Ancestry is available on computers in the main and branch libraries only. When you sign up to use one of the library's computers, ask the librarian to sign you in to Ancestry.

If this is your first time using Ancestry and you want to be able to save the results of your research in the Ancestry database then you need to create a new family tree. To do this, select Start a New Tree from the Family Trees menu on the menu bar at the top of the page. When you start a tree you will be asked to enter information about yourself, your parents and your grandparents. As you enter information about your ancestors you will begin seeing leaf symbols appear. If you click on a leaf it will take you to records such as birth, marriage, death, census and others that might provide more information about your ancestor.

If you don't want your family information available on a public computer, you can still use the library tools to do your research. In Ancestry you can use the Search menu to search for records for a particular person. The search form will allow you to enter things like the person's name, birth date, marriage date, names of other family members etc.  Enter as much or as little information as you wish. Entering more information will reduce the number of results but may cause you to miss some if what you enter doesn't exactly match what is in the record. As you find records of interest you can print copies or if you bring a flash drive to the library, you can save them there.

If you have questions please ask a library staff member. 

What's new Harold the Bear February 22, 2015

Concept picture of library snow fort. Not pictured:  Library Bear hiding inside

Harold the Library Bear prepares for EPIC SNOWBALL FIGHT!

Hedgesville, WV – I walked into the Hedgesville Public Library this morning and was surprised to see Harold the Library Bear standing over a pile of ice cubes he had poured on the carpet in the Children’s Department.

When I asked him what was going on, he said, “I’m building an ice fort of course!”

He further elaborated: “There’s a big snowball fight here at the library on Saturday February 28th at 11, so I’m getting ready now! I need a fort to protect myself!”

A snowball fight in the library? It sounded hard to believe, but after talking with the Hedgesville Library staff, everything started to make sense. They said that they are indeed planning a snowball fight, but not like the one Harold was expecting.

“It’s a special kind of snowball fight?” Harold asked, disbelieving. “An indoor snowball fight with soft snowballs that don’t make people wet or cold?”

 “Ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh,” he added, after a moment. “I guess that makes more sense. I was wondering how the books would stay dry, plus I was worried someone might get hurt! These soft, pretend snowballs are much better.”

“Of course,” he added, “I’m still going to win, even with pretend snowballs! Most people don’t know it, but out of all the forest animals, bears are the best snowball fighters!

-Harold the Library Bear is a bear, so he doesn’t have a phone, but you can leave him a message at (304)-754-3949 or you can meet him Monday-Saturday in the Children’s Department of the new Hedgesville Public Library. His column appears every week on the Martinsburg-Berkeley County Public Libraries blog.

What's new?--book review

Good Reads from the North!

Do you enjoy Sherlock Holmes?  He never seems to go out of style. 

From movies to public television, and now primetime, network television!  Well, there is a spinoff book by Anthony Horowitz (writer of the YA Alex Rider series and Foyle’s War on PBS) that is pretty good!  Moriarty is the second Sherlock Holmes book written by Horowitz, the first being House of Silk.  Where House of Silk followed the pursuits of Holmes and Watson, Moriarty explores what really happened at Reichenbach Falls.  Holmes fans will remember that Reichenbach Falls is where Holmes and his arch enemy Moriarty tumble to their deaths… or did they?

There are multiple twists to the plot as the adventure moves from Reichenbach Falls to the streets of London and back again.  This book is a good read for anyone who loves Sherlock Holmes or just enjoys a good mystery.

-Dana Phelps

What's new--Harold the Bear?

Harold the Library Bear makes his triumphant return!

Hedgesville, WV – After a long hiatus while he settled into his new position at the new Hedgesville Public Library building, Harold the Library Bear has announced that he will be resuming his weekly duties as the Voice of the Library.

“It’s been a long time,” Harold said, “Between running last year’s summer reading program and supervising the move into our new building, I’ve been swamped!”“But that’s the price I pay for being the official Library Bear,” Harold continued. “I’m very much in demand.”

When asked what he’d been up to the last few months, Harold had good news.

“I’ve had a great time getting everything just right in my new library,” he said, “and the staff that works out here is great! They’re always giving me new clothes to wear. I’ve gotten so many new outfits, I don’t have room in my closet!”

“Plus,” he added, “I’ve met so many new boys and girls since we moved, and I get to play with them every day!”

“But Friday is my favorite day,” Harold decided. “Friday morning at 10:30 is when we have our preschool story time, and I usually end up as a chair for the boys and girls while they hear a story! I can’t wait to see them all again!”

-Harold the Library Bear is a bear, so he doesn’t have a phone, but you can leave him a message at (304)-754-3949 or you can meet him Monday-Saturday in the Children’s Department of the new Hedgesville Public Library. His column appears every week on the Martinsburg-Berkeley County Public Libraries blog.

What's new

The Encyclopedia of Diversity and Social Justice--Review

An excellent and timely title that has been recently added to the print reference collection at the Martinsburg Public Library is The Encyclopedia of Diversity and Social Justice (call number R 305.8003 Encycl).

The Encyclopedia of Diversity and Social Justice contains over 300 entries alphabetically arranged for straightforward and convenient use by scholars and general readers alike. This reference is a comprehensive collection of designated entries that describe, in detail, important diversity and social justice themes. The compiler, assisted by a network of contributors and consultants, has provided a centralized source and convenient way to discover the modern meaning, richness, and significance of diversity and social justice language, while offering a balanced viewpoint.

Examples of entries in this two-volume set include:  Accessibility, African American, Antiracism, Biculturalism, Chicano, Colorism, Desegregation, Diversity Management, Ethnocentrism, Glass Ceiling, Hispanic American Cultures, Intolerance, Juneteenth, LGBT Rights, Melungeons, Nonviolent Civil Disobedience, Protestant Ethic, Racial Identity, Social Justice, Terrorism, Urban Culture, and Worldview. The terms in this set have been carefully chosen to present the common usage of words and themes that dominate our daily lives.

The essays in each entry provide alternative views to popular doctrines and philosophical truths, and include many of the most popular terms used in current conversations on the topic, from ageism to xenophobia. With contributions from experts in various fields, the entries consist of topics that represent a wider context among a diverse community of people from every walk of life.

What's new?--Book Clubs

What about Book Clubs?

Book clubs have gained popularity in recent years. There are book clubs for all ages - even preschoolers. Preschoolers come to the library for a story and craft time. This can be a start for a lifelong love of reading. As children begin to read for themselves, they can participate in book discussions for their age group.

There are many benefits of being in a book club for school aged students:

·         Participants generally have higher grades

·         Participants have better language and literary skills

·         Participants use conversation to increase reading and vocabulary comprehension

·         Conversation allows new ideas to be presented and different perspectives to be formed.

·         Participants can make new friends

·         Participants can develop critical thinking through questions and answers.

·         Discussion fosters creative thinking and writing skills

·         Book Clubs expose students to a variety of genres

Adult books groups are also growing in popularity.  According to the Good Read website approximately 5 million people are involved in a book group. Some are purely for social reasons and others are for discussion. Regardless of the reason, there is a love of reading, whether it is the latest best seller or a nonfiction book.  There are three things that a book group does for people:

·         Book groups push participants outside of their comfort zone. Participants may read a book that they would not normally pick up.

·         Book groups promote discussion and analysis.  Every person has a different opinion and it can be expressed in a non-threatening situation.

·         Book Groups promote active reading.

The Martinsburg-Berkeley County Public Libraries offer book discussions for all ages.  Call or stop by a branch near you to see what book we are reading next.

-Molly Brady and Dawn Weber

From the Director's Chair --February 2015

From the Director’s Chair
with Pam Coyle...

Although T. S. Eliot called April the cruelest month, February is possibly the dreariest. Usually cold, with little to do and less ambition to do it, you can become depressed if you have SAD (seasonal affective disorder) or don’t have a sweetie for Valentine’s Day, in financial trouble because you overspent on the holidays or owe the IRS, and disappointed if you have abandoned all but the easiest of your January resolutions.

Tell me something I don’t know, you say?

February is also Library Lover’s Month—a reason for rejoicing in my opinion. Find a way to convey your love of libraries to your legislators and other elected officials. Most people know that this month is Black History Month as well—come in to view the display done by our own Tamesa Hampton. This display and accompanying bibliography illustrate this year’s Summer Reading Program themes of Every Hero has a Story and Escape the Ordinary. Read about people who exemplify these qualities.

Other less known celebrations are associated with February. From National Blah Buster Month to Return Carts to the Supermarket Month to International Twit Award Month, February offers unique opportunities to put fun in your life.

On February 16th, do a grouch a favor, it is the one day of the year designated for this purpose; you can have a tooth ache on February 9^th; on February 28^th, you can observe Public Sleeping Day—just don’t wake up your boss with snoring or do it in the library.

The library can help you find this entire trivia and more to amuse yourself and your family on cold days and nights when you don’t want to move from your warm and cozy homes. You may want to put this trivia to good use by forming a “Brain Game” team and joining other teams to support Literacy efforts in the Eastern Panhandle in April.  For more information call the Literacy office at 304-264-0298.

Although the library is a source of serious information from tax assistance [See article in this newsletter] to how to fix broken pipes, it is also a place where you can lose yourself in other worlds with science fiction and fantasy books, travel to other countries without leaving home, and enjoy the humor and foibles of other people through fact and fiction.

Yes, February can be a dreary gray month but it also can be the month you take time to explore different worlds, different times and different people either by coming to the library or searching our reference section of databases on our homepage.

-Pam Coyle, MBCPL Director

What's new--View from the computer lab

            View from the Computer Lab

An average day at the computer lab is on its best days is a flurry of questions and answers with a few dead zone rest periods in between where all goes silent.  There are others where there are no breaks and the only dead zone is about twenty minutes before the lab closes meaning you have about ten minutes before all of the stragglers try to jump on for last minute printing.

My previous job was at a college library in Maryland similarly answering technical questions and keeping an eye on the computers. In comparison, the systems are a bit older and the computers need a bit more love to function properly. I also manage about half of the computers I used to for twice the amount of time sessions, but also running the print jobs, Wi-Fi connections and just general maintenance it’s easy to keep busy.

What I found I like absolutely best about working in the Martinsburg library computer lab however, is the appreciation and look of happiness on people’s face as they’re able to accomplish something they otherwise could not, be it getting on social network just to relax and give their mental state a breather to completing a job application or tax forms that are a necessity. 

What’s considered so little and a right to young adults who have grown up with technological access and take that privilege for granted, is a gift to people who haven’t the same advantages in life.

~ Treena