There are resources for kids' book tastings, but what about the grown people? Here's a how-to for hosting a book tasting for adults at a public library.

So, you're planning programming for the adults in your library and you're looking to change it up? From time to time, this question is posed on the awesome Programming Librarian Interest Group and librarians respond with lots of great possibilities. I thought I'd compile a list and share. Perhaps some of these ideas might work for your library? Local 1. Local History Talks/Presentations 2. Local History Walk 3. Genealogy DIY Crafts 1. Paper Making 2. Stab Binding Books 3. Christmas Ornaments 4. Shibori Scarves 5. Water Color Scarves 6. Soy Candles 7. Glycerin Soap 8. Beading 9. Altered Books Technology 1. Digital Photography Classes 2. How to Use Facebook/Pinterest/Instagram/Snapchat, etc. 3. iPhoneography (taking and editing pics with iPhone) 4. Intro to Windows 10 Food 1. Cookbook Club 2. Cooking Classes 3. Soup Night / Pie Night (patrons bring in food to share) 4. Rose Hip Jelly Making 5. Downton Abbey Tea 6. Wine Tasting 7. Edible Book Contest Presenters 1. Paranormal/Haunted Presentations 2. Pet Psychic 3. Professional Headshots for Facebook Profiles 4. Discovering New England Stone Walls 5. Falconry 6. Beekeeping and Honey Tasting 7. Yoga 8. Meditation 9. Veteran Author Talks 10. Living History Performances and Re-enacting Educational 1. Car Seat Safety Program 2. Business Networking/Speed Networking 3. Job Prep (Resume writing, Mock interviews) 4. DIY Home Repair 5. Pearl Harbor (75th anniversary in December) 6. Show Great Courses Lectures 7. Interior Design 8. Travel on a Budget 9. Identity Theft 10. Etsy/eBay 11. DIY Bike Repair Gardening 1. Gardening Presentations 2. Plant Swap 3. DIY Terrarium Writing 1. Publishing Your Writing 2. Writing Memoirs 3. Open Mic Nights Fun / Entertainment 1. Family Movie Nights 2. Star Trek Program (50th Anniversary is coming soon) 3. Introduction to Drones 4. Bridge 5. Collectibles & Antiques 6. Plan the Perfect Staycation 7. Mah Jongg 8. Couponning 9. Coloring Books 10. Chinese New Year Places for Partnerships If you are looking to increase your attendance numbers, partnerships are a great way to do so: America Red Cross (for blood drives hosted at libraries) Local Senior Center Local Historical Society Local University (The outreach office may have someone willing to do social media programs) Local Stores (Drones, DIY Home Repairs/Renovations) Additional Reading Want more ideas? Check out: "Adult Programs in the Library" by Brett W. Lear was highly recommended. You can also access PLIG's Program Speed Dating Packet for more great info and ideas. List Source The list above was pulled from these discussions: Discussion #1 and Discussion #2. You need to be a member of the Programming Facebook Group to be able to read them. Thanks to all of the librarians who shared their wisdom!

We are passionate supporters of public libraries here at Pages Unbound. But there are still awesome services and programs I would love to see libraries provide! Here are ten cool ideas that would g…

Browse Greater Victoria Public Library's offerings of free programs for kids, teens and adults. Program period: December 2016 through February 2017. GVPL is your place to connect, discover and imagine.

Want to read cool books and enter to win prizes? Check out the Bona Fide Bookworm Summer Reading Program for adults 2021!

Program Name: Around the World What: We haven’t offered this program yet, but if you had some willing patrons to talk about their trips both within the country and overseas, other patrons could attend who were interested in traveling. Sharing an itinerary, basic information about the area, accommodations, meals, etc. This would be so helpful for other travelers who are ready to make plans. Where: This is an easy program to offer in a small meeting space as I’m not sure how many people would be attending each presentation. When: This could be offered throughout the year depending on when people are traveling or returning from travel. I’d say to definitely offer something near the beginning of the year as people begin making summer travel plans around then. Who: I’d gear this program toward adults, but you could also offer a similar and more simple program for kids based on a local location many kids in your area visit or even a local landmark for people opting for a “staycation.” How: Ask patrons who enjoy traveling if they’d like to share about their trip – make a quick slideshow with some pictures of the trip and ask them to share anything that was particularly helpful for their travels. Alternatives: We’re currently offering a program called Passport Pals for kids in elementary school where they learn about a new country during every program with activities, games and snacks that correlate to that country. Promote online resources and print material that works well for travel – AtoZ World Travel or AtoZ U.S., plus we have TONS of travel books for countries and cities all over the world. During the month of April, I’ll be participating in the 2018 Blogging from A to Z Challenge. For this year’s theme, I’ll be offering you a library program plan with everything you to need to re-create it at your own library. Most of these programs we’ve offered in the past, others are programs I’d like to try in the future. I’m always looking for new inspiration and I thought you might be too!

Amazing Race: Library Edition is a program that I’ve ran twice before. It always brings out a huge crowd – and for those of us who have a small budget – it’s a great program…

Ages: Tweens, teens OR 20/30s Duration: 1.5 hours Style: Drop-in Budget: $40 Goal: To provide a silly, surprising, and highly creative atmosphere with no pressure to make something “good.” Summary:…

An exciting virtual or in-person program, Tangram Puzzles only require a few supplies and get kids thinking outside the box to be creative!

We spend many afternoons at our neighborhood library. At one point our time switched from going to find particular books, to just hanging out. For hours. Reading, exploring, asking questions, sharing, talking.... I wanted to share a quick list of fun things you can do at the library other than just check out books. Any of these ideas would be a great boredom buster. Just tell your kid you have an adventure in mind and embrace the mission with verve. You will have a great time! Please share the interesting, fun or just odd things your family does at the library in the comments! You can download a copy to keep in your purse or journal here. 1. Look at microfilm from your birthday, or a hundred years ago, or when grandma was born. 2. Look for the biggest book in the library. Take your picture with it. 3. Browse the travel section, find a place you want to visit, make some plans. 4. Go to the cookbook area, choose a recipe, go the store, get the ingredients and cook it that day. 5. Everyone find a poem, read it out loud and then copy it into your journal. 6. Choose a random CD, listen to it all the way through. 7. Kind Bomb 8. Scan the books of quotes. Find a good one and write it outside on the sidewalk with chalk. 9. Bring paper and colored pencils. Draw from the easy I-Can-Draw-Books for an hour. 10. Take a present to the librarians. 11. Leave a thoughtful review on a post-it note in a book you really loved. 12. Find out what services your library offers. Ellison machine? Study prints? Study rooms? 13. Occupy! Have a meeting, writer’s group, books club, homeschool co op, adventure planning committee at the library. 14. Make photocopies of your hand, funny book titles, weird images.... 15. Make a list of suggested books and media for your library to buy. Make the library YOUR library. 16. Arrange a library tour. 17. Browse books on the flora and fauna of your area. Learn to identify something new. 18. Check out the corresponding children’s or adult section to your favorite area (reptiles, art, mystery...) 19. Ask about the special collections. 20. Read a biography from the children’s sections on someone you know very little about.(I choose Justin Beiber). 21. Find a baby name book, make a list of funny name combinations, choose a new name for the day. 22. Hunt for authors with your same last name. 23. Look in the reference section. What is the weirdest reference book you can find? 24. Buy old magazines, cut them up and make happy posters, rehang in the library. 25. Make sure each kid has their own library card and bag. Do not fuss about late fees. Ever. ______________________________________________ Are you interested in infusing your family life with more creativity and connection? Join us in the next Mama Scout Family e-Lab. We are signing up right....NOW! I would love to have you!

The most successful displays I've done at my library have been passive readers advisory. For the last five years or so, I’ve done a monthly display of minature books based on the top YA titles checked out in my library system, with the top 10 books getting four readalikes. The Tiny Library is a collection of tiny books based on our most popular titles. Each tiny book contains reading suggestions based on our readalike list. There is a QR code that leads to a Google Form where teens can choose the books they want to pick up from the library.

Program Name: Choose Kind – Card Making for Seniors, Students, Police, Fire, Military What: We’ve offered this program a number of time in the past – a passive program that is great for any age group, any time of year. We set up a station with some basic craft supplies – paper, crayons, stickers, scissors and glue and then leave basic instructions for the kids. We’ve had the kids create thank you cards for local police and fire personnel, holiday cards for senior citizens living in assisted care communities and for students during finals week. Where: The best part about this program is that we just set it up on a table in our children’s department. It can be anywhere in the library where you have a little extra room. When: Another program that can be done at any time during the year and works really well when you need a filler program to offer – maybe during late August when summer reading is over or May before summer reading starts. Anytime of the year is a good time to choose kind. Who: We set this program up for kids of all ages, but you could offer it in the teen department, or even in the adult department and see if anyone creates anything! This could also work as a program for college students on a campus as a relaxation program during study hours for mid-terms or finals. How: This doesn’t even require a moderator, just a little staff time to pull some craft material out of the closet and to straighten up the passive program station throughout the day. We’ve often had to put a sign out for patrons to encourage them to make a card to leave at the library (and then allow them to make a card to take home for someone they know) Alternatives: Besides cards for the military, we’ve done a sock drive and collected leftover Halloween candy to send overseas. You could also do a drive for travel size bathroom goods for the homeless or a food drive for a local food pantry – remember that they receive a lot of donations around the holidays, but people are always hungry! During the month of April, I’ll be participating in the 2018 Blogging from A to Z Challenge. For this year’s theme, I’ll be offering you a library program plan with everything you to need to re-create it at your own library. Most of these programs we’ve offered in the past, others are programs I’d like to try in the future. I’m always looking for new inspiration and I thought you might be too!

So this is a summer program we’ve been hosting for 5 years now. I’ve always saved this one for the week of 4th of July–the idea being I don’t put too much work into this on…

Bad Art Night is such a good program for any library to do. Not only does it allow kids to unlock their creativity, it cleans out your old craft supplies!! It’s also great for tweens to be …

A recycled book art workshop is a easy, affordable project to do in your makerspace. Old books can easily be found from weeding libraries or at thrift stores.

The Library Adventure uses affiliate links, see our policies for more information.Kids ages 8 to 12 are often too busy with scheduled activities of their own to make it to library programs in the afternoons or evenings. For librarians who wish to increase attendance at programs for this age group, this can be very frustrating, […]

These teen volunteer programs are great ideas for teens trying to get more involved in the volunteer community. Check out our favorite ideas.

What are Maker Kits? Maker Kits are low-cost, versatile materials for open-ended creating put together in one container around a themed craft. Each kit is filled with supplies that are easy to use …

Library Escape Rooms are really big right now, so I tried to design this program so that any library can try to duplicate it. Because making something like this is kinda daunting–where do yo…

Create iPad Blackout Poetry using your choice of 3 different free apps to make poems! Celebrate Poetry Month by easily integrating this low prep & creative iPad® mobile digital device app poetry activity into your reading or writing workshop, centers or whole group lessons. Students will use the included QR codes to scan a page from a book then create a blackout poem using your choice of free apps: Pic Collage, Draw Free, or Doodle Buddy. Traditionally created using newspaper or a page from a book, a blackout poem is made when the text is colored with a black permanent marker; the few chosen words that remain form the poem. This paperless iPad blackout poetry lesson includes an anchor chart, samples, and digital text for students to use make their poems on the iPad. Packet includes everything your students need to make a paperless blackout poem on the apps independently: ★ Visual step-by-step directions for using 3 different apps to make blackout poems - your choice of Doodle Buddy, Pic Collage or Draw Free. ★ 3 unwrAPPed ready reference one-page guides - one for each app. ★ 6 QR codes that scan to public domain literature for students to pull "pages" from for their poems. You may also have students take pictures of ANY text or books in the classroom. ★ Directions for "tearing" their page from the web by taking a screenshot. ★ 1 student checklist with directions to assignment and QR code to video showing a blackout poem made by Austin Kleon. ★ 1 mini anchor chart for with a definition of blackout poetry and tips for writing one. You will need the free app Draw Free, Doodle Buddy, Pic Collage or Pic Collage Kids. Clickable QR codes to download the apps from the App Store® online store are included in this packet. Students will also need a device with a QR reader app. These are found freely on the App Store® online store as well. I recommend i-Nigma. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Since my products all utilize free web and app resources, there may be rare times that the technology does not work as planned, which may be out of my control. Please be sure to message me in the Q&A section so I can assist you before leaving feedback. I use all of the apps that I base my packets on frequently and will update products as the apps themselves update. Since this app includes a video QR filtered through safeshare.tv, I recommend clicking here to test the video to see if it works at school. However, this video is optional and the entire project can be completed without it. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ More iPad Poetry: Found Poems Haiku Poems Acrostic Poems Book Spine Poems Rhyming Poems PURCHASE THE BUNDLE OF ALL PACKETS AND SAVE: iPad Poetry BUNDLE ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ iPad and App Store are registered trademarks of Apple Inc. Erintegration is not affiliated with and has not been authorized, sponsored, or otherwise approved by Apple Inc.

Looking for some relaxing and calming crafts for adults? Check out these 35 stress relief crafts to make when you're feeling anxious and stressed.

A fun and fairly easy program to put together, Life-Size Clue was a hit with our middle school audience and something we'll repeat in the future!

How do librarians find the fastest and quickest-minded among them? With a little Speed Sorting and Cart Racing.