Book Fair workshop

Cindy and I attended a workshop about putting on a Scholastic book fair. We got some hand-outs, and I got one of the door prizes, Albert Einstein Universal Genius, but other than that it wasn't very helpful. We did get to see some of the new books, which was nice. Most of the people there had done book fairs before, but every once in a while the representative would point out something that was especially helpful for a first-timer to be sure to notice.

Not surprisingly, we were the only homeschoolers there. Many of the people were school librarians or other staff that were book fair chairpersons. I think everyone there was female, which was a little surprising.

The representative had never worked with someone doing a "box fair" (small volume expected), so she couldn't give me any specifics about how it comes or even how many boxes of books to expect. That was disappointing.

I am looking forward to doing the fair, even though this workshop wasn't very helpful. There are some optional activities that look promising, too. The Klutz "Build a book" could be fun, and the "One for Books" fundraiser is more general and easier than I thought. I'll set out the jug and a sign and see if we get any change donations. We get to buy books with the money, and we can keep them for HANCK library or donate them to whomever we want. I'm considering having a drawing or letting the volunteers choose books, depending on how much we get. Also, Scholastic donates books to charity to match the number of dollars that are raised with "One for Books."

The gal did say two things that were helpful at the end when we were talking. "You can't mess it up," and "You'll discover things that you like and things that you'll want to do differently next time." Good points to remember.

Plan on coming to HANCK's Scholastic Book Fair - Th. Oct. 9 through Sat. Oct. 11.
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