Blog

The Youth Services staff is really excited about our new website and we hope you are too! We've redesigned our Parents and Kids pages to make information easy to find and highlight some important things that maybe you didn't know about. Find the Parents and Kids pages under Guides at the top right of the page and we'll go ahead and start our brief tour. Please keep your hands inside the vehicle at all times and hold all questions until the end.

On the Parents page you'll learn about our Parent Collection that you'll find on the 2nd floor. The books in this collection are all about issues that parents may face, from toilet training to difficult teens. Another item you'll see is a list of all the preschools and daycares in the area. Lots of parents stop by our information desk asking for this information and now it's easy to find in the Parents guide. We also highlight our Museum Pass program—did you know you can get free passes to area museums with your Des Plaines Library card? While you're here, don't forget to check out the link to Cultivating Readers so you can learn great ways to encourage literacy in your children.

Of course, parents will find all sorts of other information on the website: downloadable materials (songs, magazines, and books), general library information, as well as discover new programs to come to like Frugal Friends and the DPPL Writing Group.

Next stop is the Kids page. Here are important things to know about the 2nd floor that kids might not know about, written in kid friendly language. Let's start with our preloaded eReaders and tablets. We have digital devices for kids of all ages, whether loaded with picture books and literacy apps for the younger kids or graphic novels for young adult readers. When kids need homework help, they can turn to our digital resources for answers or support. If they're stumped by a math problem, have them try the free homework help site where a live tutor will walk them through how to solve the problem. When the need arises for them to earn service credit hours, have them look at our information about volunteering for 6th graders and older.

While you can find our calendar of events near the top of the screen, we include a link to kids events on the Kids page as well. Kids (and parents) might not realize that our downloadable materials, like eBooks and music, have desirable titles kids want like Rick Riordan's House of Hades or Newbery award winner Flora and Ulysses by Kate DiCamillo. So we mention that they can find cool eMaterials for them in the Kids guide as well.

There are so many great aspects of the new website and this is just a quick mention of what you can find on the Parents and Kids guides. I hope you continue exploring all other parts of the website (psst! Teachers—there's a guide for you too!). If you have any questions about a page you can always email the staff member who created it. Hope you enjoyed the tour and we hope to see you and your kids on the 2nd floor soon!