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Category: Literacy

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Inquiring Minds: Author Takes a Deep Dive into the Library

Posted by: Wendi Maloney

Barb Rosenstock writes children’s books about people who have changed history — Ben Franklin, Theodore Roosevelt, Joe DiMaggio and racing legend Louise Smith among them. “The Noisy Paint Box,” her story about the artist Kandinsky, was a 2015 Caldecott Honor Book. In 2013, she published “Thomas Jefferson Builds a Library” about Jefferson’s massive book collection, …

Image of an ornate clock showing 2:05 with sculpted male figures sitting on each side of the clock face

Crowdsourcing Helps to Unlock the Mystery of Cursive

Posted by: Wendi Maloney

This is a guest post by Julie Miller, a historian in the Manuscript Division, and Victoria Van Hyning, a senior innovation specialist in the division. This post coincides with National Handwriting Day. “That’s so beautiful, but what does it say?” This is what we often hear from visitors to the Library of Congress when they …

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My Job at the Library: Cataloging Children’s Literature

Posted by: Wendi Maloney

This interview with Ann Sullivan was first published in the September–October issue of LCM, the Library of Congress magazine. The issue is available in its entirety online. After reading the interview, make sure to take the quiz that follows! How would you describe your work? I catalog children’s books at the Library of Congress. This …

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Letters About Literature: A Life-Changing Book

Posted by: Wendi Maloney

This is a guest blog post by Maya Mau, a 10th-grade student at West Windsor–Plainsboro High School North in Plainsboro Township, New Jersey. She is a national winner of the 2017–18 Letters About Literature contest, a reading and writing competition for students in grades four through 12 that involves reading a work and writing to …

Image of an ornate clock showing 2:05 with sculpted male figures sitting on each side of the clock face

Inquiring Minds: A Prize-Winning Passion for Books

Posted by: Wendi Maloney

This is a guest post by Ena Selimovic, a winner of this year’s National Collegiate Book Collecting Contest, which recognizes outstanding book collecting by college and university students. The Library co-sponsors the contest with the Antiquarian Booksellers’ Association of America, the Fellowship of American Bibliographic Societies and the Grolier Club. Selimovic is working on a …

Image of an ornate clock showing 2:05 with sculpted male figures sitting on each side of the clock face

Latin at the Library: Colonial and Early American Writings

Posted by: Wendi Maloney

This is a guest post by Andrew Gaudio, a reference librarian in the Researcher and Reference Services Division. As the Library of Congress’ specialist in Latin language and literature, I have come to appreciate a small but important body of Latin texts from the American British colonies and early United States written during the 17th, …

Image of an ornate clock showing 2:05 with sculpted male figures sitting on each side of the clock face

Literacy: The Library Is Looking for a Few Good Organizations

Posted by: Wendi Maloney

This is a guest post by Guy Lamolinara, communications officer in the Center for the Book at the Library of Congress. Do you work in the field of literacy or know someone who does? Then you may want to consider applying for a Library of Congress Literacy Award. Applications will be accepted from organizations that …