Looking for a program that encourages teens in your community to:

✅ participate in your library’s Summer Reading Program

✅ make use of library resources like Transparent Language Online

✅ learn a new language

Magaly Garcia, the Library Youth Coordinator at Speer Memorial Library in Mission, Texas has an idea for you.

She runs a seasonal “Adulting for Teens” event to promote library resources and pass on life skills that the teens may or may not be getting from school. Think topics like fire safety, cursive writing, and of course languages. Everyone who attends earns points toward the Summer Reading raffle prize draw.

Magaly gave us a rundown of how the program came to be.

Why promote Transparent Language Online to teens?

There’s a lot of disappointment toward the green owl on TikTok right now (IYKYK), so it felt like a good time to let our teens know the library has an alternative language learning app for them. I gave a tour of Transparent Language Online and showed them how to access it with their library card.

What did you show them during the tour?

I looked at what was popular among our patrons who use Transparent Language Online. And also what’s most relevant for teens. For example I showed them how to access the app since they’re more likely to learn on their phone than on a laptop.

And then most of the event was us learning a lesson together. With teens it’s important to find a balance between showing and doing. I let them pick a language so we all could learn the alphabet together.

What language did they pick?

I was hoping they’d pick American Sign Language and they did!

I learned how to fingerspell the manual alphabet using the course in Transparent Language Online, so I was familiar with it. I was able to pull up the alphabet lesson on the smartboard and lead the teens in learning it themselves. The goal wasn’t to learn the alphabet 100%, but to make it fun for them to try.

For teens, when introducing something unfamiliar, it helps to pair it with something familiar, especially if it’s funny. For example the letter F, if you turn your hand, looks like the hand gesture you make during “the game” (again, IYKYK but if you’re a teen you surely know). When I did that, they all died laughing. It’s silly, but it keeps them engaged and they’ll definitely remember how to sign the letter F.

How did you use the lesson to lead the learning?

We went through the first few activities to just learn the letters. How to position our hands, where to hold our hands. I had to find a balance between lecturing and letting them go at their own pace. For example a lot of them were holding their hands too high covering their faces, so I would try to show them the proper placement.

And as with anything with teens, we turned it into a game. They love competition. One of the activities in Transparent Language Online is to watch a video of someone signing a letter, then type in the correct letter. They had to race to tell me which letter to type, and they had fun arguing amongst themselves if they didn’t know which it was.

It sounds like they had fun! How do you think it turned out? Would you change anything if you did another session like this?

It was a surprisingly good result considering this was the first time. We had so many teens we had to pull up extra chairs, which is a good sign. (Pun intended.) The summer reading program tie-in definitely helped draw them in, since we have some really cool raffle prizes.

If I do another one, I think I would lean into whatever is trending at the time. Maybe teach them how to fingerspell whatever slang is being used on TikTok right now. Or for animal lovers, have an animal themed ASL lesson where we learn to sign different animals. Or incorporate some kind of board game, where if you sign a word correctly, you get to advance on the board.

What’s your best advice for fellow librarians who want to incorporate an event like this into their summer reading programs?

It’s all about finding ways to make it relevant for your teens. Figure out what’s popular with them right now, like games, social media trends, TV shows, anything and everything. Find ways to incorporate that into your session. That combo of something new and something familiar really works. Also make jokes. Poke fun at yourself if you make mistakes so they feel comfortable doing the same.

💡Transparent Language Online Tip

Want to incorporate language learning into your Summer Reading Program but aren’t able to host a similar event or want to expand it beyond teens?

Reward patrons for time spent learning a language in Transparent Language Online!

Participants can download their “Transcript Report” and submit it to the library to demonstrate their usage. That makes it easy you to translate their learning time into points that get counted towards reading program prizes.

Have questions about how to make this happen? Reach out to us at libraries@transparent.com.