Thursday Feb 09

Download eBooks from the Library

December 29th, 2011

Did you receive an eReader as a gift? Would you like to learn how to download books from the Library for free? Check out the times for our upcoming classes!

For users of eReaders like the Nook:

Date: Wednesday, 1/4/2012
Start Time: 11:00 AM

Date: Thursday, 1/5/2012
Start Time: 7:00 PM

For users of the iPads, iPods and other Mac products

Date: Wednesday, 1/4/2012
Start Time: 7:00 PM

Date: Friday, 1/6/2012
Start Time: 10:00 AM

For Kindle users:

Date: Wednesday, 1/11/2012
Start Time: 2:00 PM

Date: Wednesday, 1/11/2012
Start Time: 7:00 PM

If you can’t make it to one of these classes, you can make an appointment with a Computer Tutor.  Computer Tutors are available for one-on-one instruction in downloading Library eBooks.  Contact the Information Desk at 563-344-4179 to make an appointment. Appointments for Computer Tutors need to be made at least 24 hours in advance.

Posted in Uncategorized | No Comments »

Global Gathering Brazil Continues

October 7th, 2011

Global Gathering Brazil is more than half over already!  Have you scheduled time to come to any of the events?  You better hurry!  Click here for full information. Here’s a summary what we’ve got left:

Mystery Book Discussion: Blood of the Wicked by Leighton Gage
Date: Saturday, October 08, 2011
Start Time: 9:30 AM

Brazilian Rainforests
Date: Monday, October 10, 2011
Start Time: 7:00 PM

Brazilian Film: The House of Sand
Date: Tuesday, October 11, 2011
Start Time: 6:30 PM

Children’s Day – Global Gathering: Brazil
Date: Wednesday, October 12, 2011
Start Time: 4:00 PM

Portuguese for Travelers
Date: Monday, October 17, 2011
Start Time: 7:00 PM

Contemporary Books Discussion: Brazil on the Rise by Larry Rohter
Date: Wednesday, October 19, 2011
Start Time: 1:00 PM

Contemporary Books Discussion: Gabriela, Clove and Cinnamon by Jorge Amado
Date: Wednesday, October 19, 2011
Start Time: 7:00 PM

Color, Pattern and Textiles of Brazil–Global Gathering Brazil
Date: Thursday, October 20, 2011
Start Time: 7:00 PM

Brown Bag Lunch – Peter Fletcher
Date: Friday, October 21, 2011
Start Time: 12:00 PM

Taste of Brazil
Date: Sunday, October 23, 2011
Start Time: 2:00 PM

World Affairs Council/World Community Institute: Brazil’s Political Past and how it affects Brazil today
Date: Tuesday, October 25, 2011
Start Time: 7:00 PM

Senior Day: Edgar Crockett Quartet
Date: Thursday, October 27, 2011
Start Time: 1:30 PM

Posted in Uncategorized | No Comments »

RAINFOREST PRESENTATION on Monday, October 10, 7:00 p.m.

October 7th, 2011

Augustana College Professor Bohdan Dziadyk will lecture and show slides from Augustana College trips to the neotropical systems of the Amazon basin which include the greatest remaining rainforests on Earth.  A majority of these are in Brazil.  The Amazon basin, roughly the size of the continental USA, drains nearly three million square miles of land or about 40% of South America.  In addition to tropical rainforests, Brazilalso contains deciduous and seasonal forests as well as savannas and other natural communities.  The diversity of plants and animals of this largest South American country is greater than that of any other country on Earth.  Today, however, this diversity is threatened by rampant cutting of the forests of cattle pastures, lumber, colonization for subsistence farming, and for commercial agriculture.  Although much of these tropical forests remain, there is increasing concern that strong protective measures must be taken to preserve their native peoples, biodiversity, and ecological resources.

Meet our presenter:

Since 1980, Bohdan Dziadyk has taught classes in botany and ecology at Augustana College, and for twenty years he has been director of the three field stations owned by the College.  He has participated in five Augustana international terms to numerous countries in Latin America, including Brazil, and has also traveled and taught in the ancient cities and forests of India.

Tags: , ,
Posted in Uncategorized | No Comments »

Free Beginner & Advanced Kite workshops for all ages still have openings

September 3rd, 2011

Wednesday, September 7, no registration for beginners (ages 6-11) from 4:00 p.m.-4:30 p.m. and from 4:30 p.m.-5:00 p.m. in the Bettendorf Single Room.  Quad City Kite Club founder James Patten will help all comers make a single paper airplane-style or sled-style kite.

Same day in the Gilbert Room, 5:00 p.m.-6:00 p.m., registration is required for the advanced workshop (ages 12 and older).  Yes, adults are welcome.  Though there is a limit of one kit per family, more than one family member can work a kite.  Patten will help these participants make a traditional Brazilian Buka fighter kite.  All materials will be provided, using kits from the Drachen Foundation Store.   Please register by calling 563-344-4175 or online through our calendar of events at www.bettendorflibrary.com or in-person at the Library.

Global Gathering Brazil is sponsored by Iowa American Water and the Bettendorf Public Library Foundation.

Tags: ,
Posted in Uncategorized | No Comments »

Last week for Nonfiction Genre Study–World War II

July 26th, 2011

The Nonfiction Genre Study concludes this week with some suggestions for reading about World War II.  Go to the “Adult Services” tab at the top of our homepage, click on “Genre Studies” from the dropdown menu, and take a look.  Make a comment at the end of any entry.  If you need one more item in order to finish the Adult Summer Reading Program “Novel Destinations” log, you can count that comment.  

Saturday, July 30, is the final day of the 2011 Summer Reading Program, so try to have your log turned in by then.  We hope you enjoyed the variety and bit of a challenge involved in completing this year’s log.

Tags: , ,
Posted in Uncategorized | No Comments »

Nonfiction Genre study continues this week with SCIENCE

June 30th, 2011

Go to our homepage and the Adult Services tab near the top.  Choose “Genre Studies” from the drop-down menu.  Barb explored African Memoirs last week, Mark is studying Science this week, and Hedy will be engulfed with Travel next week.  We encourage you to make a comment on any entry.  You can even use making a comment as a book read for the Adult Summer Reading program!

Posted in Uncategorized | No Comments »

Nonfiction Genre Study Continues…Cooking!

June 14th, 2011

Check out the Adult Summer Reading Program Nonfiction Genre Study where Library staff suggest books on a different topic every week.  Anyone can comment–and if you’re signed up for our Adult Summer Reading Program, you can count that comment as one of the books you need to read to complete the Log. 

This week we’re discussing cooking–especially memoirs related to that activity.  Go to our homepage, then to the “Adult Services” tab near the top.  Click on “Genre Studies” from the drop- down menu and you’re in!  You may comment on any post.

Tags: ,
Posted in Uncategorized | No Comments »

Nonfiction genre study blog available–this week: HUMOR!

June 6th, 2011

During our Adult Summer Reading Program (Novel Destinations), the Adult Services Staff created a blog looking at narrative nonfiction titles in which the reader participates in lifelong learning and is also compelled to read through plot and characterizations as in the tradition of fiction.

Participation is free and easy for all, regardless of city of residence.  Go to our website www.bettendorflibary.com, then to the “Adult Services” tab at the top of the page.  Click on “Genre Studies” from the drop-down menu.  When you want to reply or suggest more titles, simply click on the word “comment” at the bottom of any entry.

BPL staff will be taking turns once a week suggesting titles from the universe of nonfiction.  Last week we explored the Environment with Hedy.  This week we’ll be tickled with Humor from Maria.

Books suggested by staff and by patrons on the blog will be on display in Display Central through July 30 and can all be checked out.  Look for them!

Tags: , ,
Posted in Uncategorized | No Comments »

Blooming in the Emily Dickinson Garden: Daisies!

June 1st, 2011

Oxeye Daisy (Leucanthemum vulgare)

“Here, where the Daisies fit my Head // ‘Tis easiest to lie…”

Posted in Uncategorized | No Comments »

Hedy promotes poetry and reviews “Leading from Within”

May 5th, 2011

As many Library patrons and my colleagues know, I love poetry!  I always try to have some poetic display or program for National Poetry Month in April.  At every staff meeting I attend, I share a poem.  If there’s room on bibliographies I create, I add a poem.  It’s the frosting on the cake, the cherry on the sundae, so to speak.  For many years, St. Ambrose University English Professor Bea Jacobson has led discussions of Emily Dickinson’s poetry sometime during the month of her birth (December) and death (May) because there is an Emily Dickinson Garden on the Library grounds and because Dickinson is an icon of American poetry beloved the world over by all age groups.  If you’ve interest, join us this year at 7 p.m. on Wednesday May 11 for a discussion of Dickinson’s poetry on war.  She wrote many of her 1000+ poems during the American Civil War.  If you want to read the poems we’ll be discussing ahead of time, hardcopy texts are available at the Library or I can email or mail them to you.  Contact me at hhustedde@bettendorf.org or 563-344-5705.

“Leading from Within: Poetry That Sustains the Courage to Lead” edited by Sam M. Intrator and Megan Scribner 808.819 LE

A poet is a person who “lets drop a line that gets remembered in the morning.”–E.B. White

As many Library patrons and my colleagues know, I love poetry!  This is a book I gave my husband as a gift and then I read it aloud to him one poem a day till we finished.  One of the things I really like about this book is that dozens of “leaders” chose a poem which meant something to them and told the reader why.  These are poems that inspired these leaders in some way–intellectually, emotionally, spiritually.  Maybe one of them will do the same for you!

What I found gratifying was that so many of my favorite poets were cited: Naomi Shihab Nye, T.S. Eliot, Wendell Berry, Mary Oliver, Pablo Neruda, and (of course) Emily Dickinson…  And the final chapter included intriguing and potentially useful sections like “Finding Poems That Matter”, “Using Poems as Companions”, “Waking Yourself Up with a Poem”, “Using Poems as Talismans”…

In honor of the current season, here’s a section from Mary Oliver’s “Spring Azures”:

In spring the blue azures bow down / at the edges of shallow puddles / to drink the black rain water. / Then they rise and float away into the fields. // Sometimes the great bones of my life feel so heavy, / and all the tricks my body knows– / the opposable thumbs, the kneecaps, / and the mind clicking and clicking– // don’t seem enough to carry me through this world / and I think how I would like // to have wings– / blue ones– / ribbons of flame….

Tags: , ,
Posted in Uncategorized | No Comments »

« Older Entries