Library
Read On! Annual Report
Last week, libraries across Oklahoma submitted their annual reports to the Oklahoma Department of Libraries. It’s a good time to get a snapshot of the past year and to start making future plans and goals.
In the annual report, I get to tell the state how we spent our money, how many items we have available to our community, and how many community members we served in various ways.
In our physical collection, we have 33,789 bound books; 1,371 audiobooks and music CDs; and 1,460 DVDs. This means our building currently holds 36,620 items.
In our digital collection, we have 42,927 ebooks; 10,937 audiobooks; and 682 videos. This makes our complete collection an impressive 91,166 items available to our community.
I’m proud to say we had 50,024 items checked out of our physical library. When we add the number of items checked out of our digital library, that number goes up to 77,715 checkouts. That’s a lot! You guys were busy!
Speaking of you guys, we’ve got 12,182 active library users. In a town of less than 10,000 and a county of just over 40,000, I’m quite pleased with that number. And I’m even more excited every month when I look at how many more people get new library cards — almost 70 a month!
Last but not least, my two favorite statistics to watch: We had 63,886 visitors through our doors (over 200 each day) and we answered 21,187 questions! We love answering your questions, so keep them coming!
Thank you so much for using your Pryor Public Library so often and so well. We are truly having a wonderful time serving our community. And if you haven’t been to the library in a while, come check us out!
If you’d like to let us know how we can serve you better, come to our focus group meetings on Aug. 27th and 30th from 6 – 7 PM in our meeting room. We’ll have cookies.
Read On! First Day of School
When I was in school, I always viewed the first day of school like New Year’s Day. It’s a day for new beginnings. To encourage new habits, to reinvent my scholarly self, to perfect my planner’s color coding, and to finally break my habit of procrastination. (I never accomplished that last one.)
If the first day of school is similar for you and your family, I encourage you to add the library to your list of scholarly resolutions.
Some suggestions:
Make the library building a place for you and/or your kids to do homework.
Search the library’s online resources when doing research before trying Google.
Make friends with the library staff at the beginning of the school year so you don’t feel shy about asking for help once the research projects are assigned.
Include at least one fun read each month while you slog through all the required reading.
Learning Express, Mango, and EBSCO are probably our most student-friendly online resources. If you haven’t checked them out, I encourage you to grab your library card number and explore them. Learning Express features math, reading, and writing lessons from fourth grade through college level and will help you get ready for just about any standardized test. Mango is our language learning resource that’s fun and easy to use. EBSCO is a suite of resources for all your researching needs.
To explore at home, you’ll need to go to our website (pryorlibrary.org), find the “Use the Library” tab on the right and head down to the “Research & Resources” link. From that page, you’ll find all of our online resources available to you from home. You simply need your library card number to access them.
If you need help getting started with one of our online resources, please let the library staff know. We would love to help you find what you need.
Read On! Summer Reading
Summer is here and we’re so excited! It’s our busiest time of year with our Summer Reading Program for children, teens, and adults. We have classes and activities almost every day of the week and we have a huge increase in the number of people we see each day. It’s fantastic!
Beyond being super fun for both library staff and, we hope, our community, our Summer Reading Program has a very important purpose: it encourages kids and teens to read all summer long. All the research says that when students read over their summer break, they do better the next school year and avoid the dreaded “Summer Slide” where they forget what they learned the previous year.
We want our Summer Reading Program to be fun for all ages, so we have several different ways to participate. For our youngest participants, grab our Toddlers’ Activity Sheet with listening goals and family-friendly activities. For every five activities completed, the child gets a free book!
For kids entering Kindergarten through sixth grades, our Kids’ Reading Record Sheet is a place to keep track of time spent reading (or listening). For every 10 circles (five hours) completed, the child gets a free book!
For teens entering grades seven through twelve, our Teens’ Reading Record sheet uses lines to keep track of time spent reading. For every two hours of reading, teens get entered into a weekly prize drawing. For every 10 hours, they get a free book!
Because we all know kids mimic what the adults in their lives do (and because kids shouldn’t have all the fun), we have a reading and activity Bingo sheet just for grown-ups. For every Bingo, adults are entered into a weekly prize drawing. When you get a blackout, you’re entered in our grand prize drawing.
Visit the Library to sign up!
The Library will be closed for Memorial Day
