Lisa Elliott
Teen Librarian- Tigard Public Library
OYAN SRP Rep
On Saturday, September 25, my brain was quite busy. I was thinking about how nice it was to work from home for a day of Youth Services Summit sessions with my fellow library people. I was thinking about whether I would have enough time during the break to slip out and shop for the last of the ingredients for my kids’ birthday cake, which I would ultimately spend five hours baking in the most Pinteresty moment of my entire motherhood, past or future. I was thinking about Summer Reading Program innovations, the towering TBR pile further embiggened by Angie Manfredi’s recommendations, and the most tactful way to tell a potential book challenger NOPE. Finally, I was thinking about thinking during the last session of the summit, Danielle Jones’ Transforming Teen Services program, Computational Thinking: Libraries’ Role in Building Teen Problem-Solving Skills.
Computational Thinking (a set of overlapping problem-solving skills which can be used in a variety of settings*) is a framework that can be applied to all our library programming. It’s not just for educators or technology users, it’s for everybody. And guess what? You’re already doing it. The Computational Thinking approach provides opportunities for tinkering, creating, de-bugging, persevering, and collaboration. Sounds like a library program, no? We discussed several real-life examples, including one library’s (I can’t remember which one. Please comment if this was your program. You deserve credit for doing something so messy fabulous!) paint with Bob Ross event that had teens racing to keep up with the happy tree painter’s instructions without pausing. Participants may have been frustrated with the pace at first, but once they realized it was part of the fun, they embraced the experience. They persevered as they created. They tinkered with various techniques while collaborating with each other and the curly-haired (it’s a perm, you know) master himself. As they worked, they manipulated abstractions into representational art. They recognized patterns in both their landscapes and the techniques they were using, and they learn from their instructor’s algorithmic approach, making plans and applying paint in a specific order to achieve a desired effect. Most importantly, they were given a valuable opportunity to make mistakes. It’s impossible for anyone to paint right along with Mr. Ross, which gave the teens a chance to practice failure, to learn that it’s no big deal, and it can be fun! What a valuable, anxiety-relieving lesson.
So, let me re-iterate that Computational Thinking is a thing you are already doing in your library programs. However, much as intentionally incorporating our Early Literacy knowledge into storytimes improves those events for kids and their caregivers, intentionally applying a Computational Thinking lens to our program planning can produce more impactful events for teens. And we can save the jargony language of Computational Thinking for our administrators and grant writing, thus making us sound all academic and impressive.
Thank you, Danielle, for a great session. And thanks to Greta and CSD folks for planning a terrific Summit!
*More about Computational Thinking here: https://digitalpromise.org/initiative/computational-thinking/ P.S. Here’s the cake. Look at it! It will never happen again. Yes, thank you, Paul Hollywood, I will accept your handshake.
OYAN - Oregon Young Adult Network 
