Part of the Collaborative Literacy Learning Series hosted by the State Library of North Carolina and NCLive.

Social Emotional Learning (SEL) has always been an important part of education and human development. With the ongoing pandemic and shocking headlines (including a mass shooting in my hometown) now, more than ever, we are prompted to help caregivers and young children learn how to express and understand their emotions. With the overwhelming amount of books in this genre, this webinar will help us choose books that involve SEL learning and also use (just about) any books, music and other storytime material to decipher feelings. 
Attendees will learn to: 

● Choose age-appropriate materials for subject matter, with many examples. 

● Create opportunities for conversations during storytimes and receive hints on how to deal with sticky emotional situations, from parents talking during storytime to a child’s hard question or comment during storytime. 

● Build connections with children, so they feel heard and foster lasting relationships beyond storytimes. 

● Connect caregivers to resources where they can get answers to questions from places other than books. Keeping in mind, we are not experts in this field. 

● Workshop with other members of the library field to help each other with SEL, not only for patrons, but also ourselves because children’s librarians are amazing and we deserve it! 

Led by Melanie Borski-Howard, Youth Services Librarian at Boulder Public Library