RRISD Book Cart Drill Team Takes 2nd Place

Our "Alice in Wonderland" themed presentation fighting against censorship was a hit at the Texas Library Association conference!  RRISD won 2nd place this year. Mrs. Young and I were 2 of the 13 RRISD librarians who participated. We had a blast!

Mrs. Fournier Meets LeVar Burton

I had an incredible experience at TLA this year. I got to meet one of my biggest inspirations as a reader, teacher and librarian- LeVar Burton. When he first came out on stage at TLA as our opening session speaker, 1,000 librarians were thrilled as he invited us to sing! We all sang the theme to "Reading Rainbow" together. His speech was awesome, weaving in attributes of technology, reading, freedom to choose your own things to read, and his various projects throughout the years.

After his speech, people could go buy his new picture book and get them signed.  I got to meet LeVar Burton! It was truly a dream come true for me! I told him that he was a big reason why I was a librarian, and that my daughter, Harper, loves to sing the theme to "Reading Rainbow."  He told me to tell Harper that LeVar loves her!

Sat Next to Nathan Hale @Texas Bluebonnet Award Luncheon

I also attended the Texas Bluebonnet Award luncheon and was so excited to find out that I was seated next to Nathan Hale, author of Hazardous Tales series.  It was super fun to sit next to him and listen to Laban Carrick Hill & Theodore Taylor, the award winning author and illustrator, respectively, of When the Beat Was Born, Texas Bluebonnet award winner.  Nathan and I talked about how we can get him to visit Forest North next year and talk to our 3rd-5th graders!

Texas Library Association Conference 2016

Mrs. Young and I were so excited to attend the 2016 Texas Library Association Conference in Houston last week.  We missed Forest North a lot, but we came back energized with lots of new ideas about how to make the library even better for our students and staff!

I participated in a session called "Speed Dating the Bluebonnet Books."  Librarians pay to come to this session to raise money for the Texas Bluebonnet Award, and they get to rotate around about 20 tables, meeting authors or Texas Bluebonnet committee members to get background and programming ideas about the books.  They also get many of next year's books for free and can get them signed by the authors.  As an outgoing committee member, I showed up to help, but Doreen Cronin was unable to attend because of the terrible weather affecting Houston.  Suddenly, Doreen's publisher, Michelle, and I were in charge of presenting Ms. Cronin's book Chicken Squad, to all of the rotating librarians!  We came up with a short presentation and had a blast presenting it to tons of librarians!

Ursula Vernon, author of Hamster Princess

Cassie Beasley, author of Circus Mirandus

Josh Lieb, author of Ratscalibur

Joel Ross, author of Fog Diver

RRISD "Hip Hop Librarians" Practice for State Competition

The RRISD "Hip Hop Librarians" have been working since winter break to get ready for our entry in the Book Cart Drill Team State competition at the Texas Library Association conference.  We practice late in the evenings and write and record our songs on the weekends to get ready for this celebration of libraries and reading! I write the songs with some of my fellow team members, and do all the singing and rapping myself!  We have two new members this year, featured in the very front of this photo, including Forest North co-librarian Mrs. Young!  We're hoping to defend our state title and win the competition again this year.  Fingers crossed! Check out some of our older performances in these videos below:

2010

2011

2012

2015