Category: Sports

May is National Bike Month. Sisters, Sierra (right) and Savana (left) celebrate by snuggling up in our Kid Spot with Chilly the Library Penguin to read “Sally Jean, the Bicycle Queen” by Cari Best.  What are you going to do for National Bike Month?

A local student group, Guys and Gals on the Go, are collecting used running shoes for One World Running. This non-profit group collects used running shoes and distributes them to shelters and churches within the U.S. and ships them to developing countries around the world. One World Running accepts running shoes in every condition. Shoes that are too worn to pass on are ground up and used to make running tracks and playgrounds. The Chelsea Public Library has agreed to be a drop off point for Guys and Gals on the Go, so bring in those old running shoes that you’ve outgrown or worn out and give them a chance to make a difference in somebody’s life!

The days of an unstructured outdoor childhood, days of pick-up ball games, treehouses, and “be home for dinner,” have all but vanished.

Children today spend their time mostly indoors in front of a screen, with TV, video games, and the internet, spending on average 8-10 hours/day.  When children do go outside, it’s mostly for scheduled events such as soccer practice or a community fair.  The Centers for Disease Control say that only 6% of children now play outside.  Even bike riding is down 31% since 1995.  And parents are afraid to let their kids out unsupervised. 

Why play outside?  Kids learn physical skills and are much less likely to be obese.  Children who play outside develop cognitive skills from imaginative play.

What to do?  Encourage your kids to play outside, and provide ideas for play.

Activities for the Great Outdoors

• A nature walk is a great way to enhance children’s appreciation of the natural environment. Encourage them to touch – to discover the smoothness of a rock or the roughness of bark. 
• Set up an obstacle course with old tires, large appliance boxes, and tree stumps. Moving through it will teach important concepts like over, under, through, and around.
• A “listening” walk makes for a wonderful sound discrimination activity. As you walk with the children, point out the sounds of birds, passing cars, and the whistling wind 
• Bring the parachute or an old sheet outside and play parachute games.
• Bring a portable boom box outdoors and let the children experience the joy of dancing in a natural environment!
• Try “water painting,” in which children paint a building with a brush and a bucket of water.
• Chasing bubbles gives children a chance to run!
• Remember the sprinkler?  Turn it on and have some fun!

GeekDad describes 30 classic outdoor games.  And ask your librarian for books of game rules! 

Here are two new authors of sports books you can find on the New Book Shelves:

Jake Maddox and Jeff Rud–check them out!

Friday 9/17  Chelsea High School football 7pm tonight! at Adrian H.S.

Saturday 9/18  University of Michigan football vs. Massachusetts 12noon at Michigan Stadium

Saturday 9/18  Michigan State University football vs. Notre Dame 8pm at East Lansing

Sounds and Sights Fest is over and the Chelsea Fair doesn’t start for another week! What to do?

Here are some family friendly ideas:
Friday night 6pm–FREE Kids Event at the Chelsea Football Stadium:  Support the Bulldogs! Meet the team! Practice with the players! Click here for more info.

Saturday and Sunday–DEXTER DAZE:  Artists, entertainment, a parade at 10:00am Saturday, children’s music, and Colors the Clown.  Click here for more info.

In case you want to venture further afield:
Friday, Saturday and Sunday–MILFORD MEMORIES: a summer festival, with more artists, entertainment and a Kids Central Activity Tent,  with craft activities including beading, painting, foam and glitter! Plus a fishing tournament and ice cream eating contest. Click here for more info.

How would you like to attend a Detroit Pistons game, just for reading?

• Read 10 books this summer, register on the Michigan Reads website, and you’ll get a FREE ticket to a Pistons game, plus an invitation to attend a FREE Party at the Palace, which includes locker room tours, photos with the NBA Championship trophies, and an on-court basketball clinic!

Not a basketball fan? No matter! After reading your 10 books and registering on the Michigan Reads website, you could choose a FREE ticket to a Tigers game OR a FREE pass to the 2010 Red Wings HockeyFest event! All just for reading! Flyers explaining this program are available at the first floor information desk in the youth department. Sign up today!

Do you like to swim and splash in the water?  Fish do, too!   And lots of other sea creatures!   And they do it in fun and crazy ways!

This year the theme for our Summer Reading Program is Make a Splash:  Read!  and we are having all sorts of great programs about water.  Check out some fun facts here or come to one of our exciting programs!

The frogfish looks like a lump of coral growing on the reef.  He blends in so he can be safe.  He perches on the coral with his fins, which kind of look like arms and legs.

The social feather duster looks like flowers, but they’re not!  They are a colony of worms that live in tubes they build in the sand or rock, and they wave feathers at the end of their bodies to catch tiny creatures in the water to eat.  If you swim by them they will close down tight in their tubes. 

Did you know that fish need clean teeth just like you?  Tiny creatures, like shrimp and gobi fish, brush their teeth for them.  Big fish swim up to a place known as a “cleaning station” and little creatures swim in their mouths and eat the pieces of fish stuck in their teeth!  If a fish didn’t have clean teeth the teeth would fall out and the fish would die!   This is known as a symbiotic relationship, where both fish help each other.   Miss Lisa, one of our librarians and a scuba diver, once ate doritos and went under water and let shrimp climb in her mouth and clean her teeth!

A flounder has two eyes on one side of its head!  It starts out like a regular fish, but it likes to lay flat in the sand to hide, so when it is a baby it decides to slide one eye over to the other side.  It takes a few days for the eye to slide over.  Can you do that?

The parrotfish protects itself when it sleeps by blowing a huge spit bubble and swiming inside it.  When a predator comes close to him it breaks the bubble, giving the parrotfish time to swim away!

The anglerfish lives deep, deep in the bottom of the ocean, several miles down where it is completely dark.  It has a glowing tip on a piece of skin that sticks out in front of his mouth.  Smaller fish can’t see the big fish, and think the glowy thing is a small jellyfish or fish, and swim up to eat it, and the anglerfish snap! eats the little fish. 

OTHER FUN FACTS

• Octopuses have three hearts.
• Starfish have eight eyes, one at the end of each leg.
• You can tell the age of a fish by looking at its scales.  They have growth rings like trees, called circuli.  Clusters of them are called annuli.  Each annuli show one year.
• The world’s largest mammal, the blue whale, weighs 50 tons at birth. Fully grown, it weighs as much as 150 tons.  It is 96 feet long.  It is as big as four large dinosaurs (Brontosauri), 23 elephants, 230 cows or 1800 men.  
• The 14-foot-long narwhal is a whale whose tooth sticks out of his head and can reach up to eight feet long.
• Fish swam in the seas long before the dinosaurs roamed the earth.
• Fish have a specialized sense organ called the lateral line which works much like radar and helps them navigate in dark or murky water. 
• A lungfish can enter a state of suspended animation out of the water for three years. You could put it in the garage for 2 years, and it would survive.

Did you know you can learn to scuba dive when you are ten years old?  Learn about it at the PADI website.  And if you would like to learn more about fish or the coral reef, look at books in the nonfiction section in the 591s or 577.70s, or ask a youth librarian for help.

Chelsea kids were thrilled this Monday, May 24, to meet Bill Fitzpatrick, a real mountain climber.  Originally from Colorado, Bill has been working at the Bivouac in Ann Arbor to earn money to keep climbing mountains.  Bill brought  a backpack full of interesting materials  to share with the kids.

The kids were all eyes as Bill pulled out all sorts of exciting things.  He showed what you need to read with a display of climbing books about mountaineering in general and specific mountains, journals about new equipment and new techniques, and handbooks on methods.  Bill showed photos of himself and his friends on various climbs, and played video about the history of climbing.

Outdoors, Bill demonstrated the technical equipment he brought.  Kids had fun holding all of the carabiners, nuts, and hexes.  Bill showed how to set up a harness with a rope, and described how two people would move together up a rock face in a way that would keep both of them safe.

Bill has climbed extensively throughout the United States.  His favorite place to climb is in the Grand Tetons.  His next trip will be to Kentucky, one of the closest places to Michigan that offers good climbing.

The Chelsea Library brings adventure to learning!

On Monday April 26th, at 4pm, the library presented: I Need to Read, Race Car Driver.  Our guests were Director of Communications Sammie Lukaskiewicz from the Michigan International Speedway, and race car driver Chad Finley.

Chad Finley began his racing career at age 10 racing go-karts.  In 2006, Finley graduated to full-bodied stock cars at just 14 years old.  In 2007, at 15 years old, he became Rookie of the Year in the Outlaw Super Late Model Division  at Spartan Speedway, the youngest driver in track history to do so.  Since then, Finley has had a winning career in racing.   This rising star has been climbing the ladder of the short track racing world over the last four seasons and looks forward to bringing his talent to both the ARCA Racing Series presented by RE/MAX and Menards as well as the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series.

Chad Finley’s current ARCA RE/MAX schedule consists of eight appearances, all televised on SPEED TV for Brad Keselowski Racing with appearances at Texas Motor Speedway, Pocono International Raceway, Michigan International Speedway, Iowa Speedway, Chicagoland Speedway, Kansas Speedway, and the 2010 finale at Rockingham Speedway in NorthCarolina in October, site of his impressive Pole award win in 2009.

Chad hopes to make his NASCAR Camping World Truck Series debut in November, also with Brad Keselowski Racing, at Texas Motor Speedway followed by appearances at Phoenix International Raceway and Homestead-Miami Speedway.

Sammie Lukaskiewicz described what racing season is like at the Michigan International Speedway, the biggest sports venue in Michigan,  and described the life of race car drivers at the race track.

Miss Lisa interviewed Chad and Sammie about all the exciting details about racing.  The kids asked a lot of questions, but already knew a great deal about racing!  Chad said his favorite thing about racing was the speed, and Sammie said her favorite thing was meeting all the people!

One lucky child got to try on the racing jumpsuit, while others were allowed to try on the helmet.  The kids had fun posing in front of a mirror.  Chad signed autograph cards, and Sammie passed out posters and pencils about the Michigan International Speedway.  See Chad’s website.  See the Speedway website.  Everyone had a wonderful time!