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The Children's Library
Children's Programs
Kids' Links
ABCmouse can only be used inside the library
Family Storytime
For children of all ages, this is a time to awaken imagination and explore new environments all while having a blast and making new friends. Family Storytime starts at 3:30 PM on Wednesdays with a story or two read to children by a librarian. After a story or two, children will be led into the Story Room for a fun craft or activity created to pair with that day's theme. When finished, children are welcome to spend the rest of their time playing with the library's toys in the Story Room's enclosed courtyard.
Little Wigglers
This program is for our youngest friends, aged 0 - 6. Little Wiggles focuses on exploring new environments, textures, and sensations in a safe, controlled setting. Babies and toddlers will listen to stories, sing songs, and learn how to socialize with one another in preparation for their futures. Parents are encouraged to play with their children and ask questions, prompting the growth and development of creative and critical thinking skills that will see them through the rest of their lives.
Brick Builders
Children aged 4+ are welcome to hang out in the Children's Library every Friday at 3:30 PM and play with the library's vast collection of Legos™. With no other activity but a free exploration of thousands of bricks, children can make friends or enjoy solitary construction.
Activities and Entertainment
Art and Music
- Lunchtime Doodles with Mo Willems
- Get Creative with Dav Pilkey
- Citizen DJ -- make your own hip-hop music through this free program from the Library of Congress
- Chrome Music Lab allows you experiment with different instruments, sounds, tempos, and more. You can even add your own voice to your songs
Classes
- Khan Academy offers free educational classes for ages 4+ in math, science, language arts, reading, AP classes, and many more subjects
- Personal Finance for TEENS and young adults -- including how to pay for college, saving and budgeting, debt and many other useful finance topics
Coding
- Computer coding games for elementary school kids
- Computer Programming with Khan Academy -- learn what programming is, drawing basics, coloring, variables, animation, text and strings, and more
- LightBot beginning coding fun for kids
- ScratchJr. teaches coding literacy for AGES 5-7
- Syracuse University offers a guide for parents to help their kids get started with compute programming. Site includes glossary of coding terms, tips for teaching kids, learning tools, and links to online coding programs (both free and pay subscriptions):
Games and Activities
- Harry Potter fans, check out this new site
- Children’s Discovery Museum of San Jose offers story times, at-home activities, science and creativity broadcasts for kids, and resources for parents too:
- Citizen DJ -- make your own hip-hop music through this free program from the Library of Congress
- Club SciKids: at home science experiments for elementary school aged kids
- Cosmic Kids teaches yoga and mindfulness for AGES 3+
- Disney Fans, check out Disney themed crafts, recipes, and family activities
- Disney Pixar Imagineering in a Box -- learn how to create a theme park
- Eric Carle offers print outs and activities related to his classic books for young children
- GoNoodle gets kids up and moving!
- Highlights offers free Hidden Picture games, jokes, recipes, and family activity ideas
- Jan Brett (picture book author) offers free activities, coloring pages and projects on her website
- Math Games offers a variety of math games for FIRST - EIGHTH GRADE
- NASA activities for students in grades K-12
- Nick Jr. offers games and tv episodes featuring favorite tv characters
- PBS Kids offers free games, activities, e-books, and tv episodes
- Chicago's WTTW PBS station's website lists a month of kids' science activities
- Peep and the Big Wide World FAMILY science activities
- Dr. Seuss themed activities
- Super Simple offers free printables, tips for parents, family activities, crafts, songs, recipes, and educational videos for PRESCHOOL-ELEMENTARY school
- Tween literary themed quizzes, activities, book trailers, and more
- Word Central -- language building games from Merriam Webster
- Word World preschool/kindergarten games, activities, and videos
Learn a Foreign Language
- Duolingo teaches foreign languages to kids in bite size lessons
- Quizlet offers free foreign language lessons
Live Animal Cams
- Audubon Bird Cams
- Cincinnati Zoo offers Facebook Live events featuring their animals weekdays at 3 pm EDT:
- Explore.org offers tons of free animal cams that show animals across the globe! See both wild and domestic animals living at animal sanctuaries
- Monterey Bay Aquarium offers a real time look at otters, birds, jellyfish, coral reef habitat, and the kelp forest habitat
- National Zoo offers a real time look at naked mole rats, lions, giant pandas, and elephants
- PANDAS! Giant Panda Cam
- San Diego Zoo offers a real time look at apes, baboons, polar bears, butterflies, koalas, elephants, giraffes, penguins and more
Performing Arts
- Kennedy Center offers recordings of its live performance including concerts, magic shows, comedy shows, and other performing arts programs
- London Symphony Orchestra
Printables
- Free printable worksheets PRESCHOOL and KINDERGARTEN ages
- AWE offers free printable educational and fun activity pages for AGES 2-5
- Nickelodeon offers fun printables featuring your kids’ favorite tv characters
- Super Simple offers free printable activities and crafts, coloring sheets, games, flash cards, and more
Virtual Tours
- Smithsonian Latino Virtual Museum
- Virtual COVID-19 Friendly Tours -- Check out this list of free virtual tours of museums, zoos, aquariums, farms, and even the International Space Station
E-Books
- California Missions: Search for your mission and click to read
- California Libraries Virtual Comic Convention: for all ages
- Children's Storybooks: Online provides illustrated stories for kids of all ages
- Library of Congress: offers digitized Classic Books for kids and teens
- EBSCO: Host provides high-quality nonfiction eBooks for students and adult learners (free with your library card)
- International Children’s Digital Library: shares stories from around the world
- American Folklore: shares folk tales and spooky legends:
- Project Gutenberg: offers Free eBooks in the public domain with curated list of children’s books
- Marvel Comics: Read all 20 Marvel’s Heroes Project comics for free
- Nursery Rhymes and Bedtime Stories
- StarFall: free animated stories and folk tales.
- U.S. States: Search for a state and then click to read online for free
Schoolwork Help
- Ebsco: offers nonfiction resources and journal articles for students and adult learners (free with your library card)
- Encyclopedia Britannica: free online encyclopedia
- GCF Global: provides reading and math help
- Grammar Check’s: online editor provides spelling, grammar, and writing style help
- Grammarly: helps you improve your writing with its AI-powered assistant
- Hippo Campus: offers a multitude of resources on core curriculum subjects for MIDDLE SCHOOL - COLLEGE
- Library of Congress: offers a variety of educational resources and activities to support at-home learning
- Khan Academy: offers daily schedules and free classes for AGES 4-18 in math, science, engineering, arts, and test prep
- Quizlet: helps you improve in Math, Science, Social Science, Languages, Arts and Humanities, and more for MIDDLE SCHOOL - HIGH SCHOOL
- Softschools: provides free worksheets, games, and quizzes for children in PRESCHOOL - HIGH SCHOOL in math, science, handwriting, and language arts
- Beyondthebackpack: Nick Jr. help get children ready for kindergarten with beloved characters
- TedEd: provides parents with hands-on interactive lessons do do with their kids
- Planes and Balloons: offers Preschool and Kindergarten skills worksheets
- ProQuest: provides curated collections to help students complete assignments by providing access to premium newspapers, magazines, and images correlated to key curricular standards and subjects
COMPASS Resources
COMPASS stands for: California Online Media Program for Access and Student Success. These resources are provided by the California State Library. Learn more about COMPASS here!
- PebbleGo Science: Designed for k-2 students, PebbleGo Science supports STEM learning in English and Spanish as well as 50 interactive STEM ebooks from Capstone.
- TeachingBooks: Features a suite of instructional resources that enrich the fictional and nonfiction books read by children and young adults.
- Britannica School: This online library database from Britannica is aimed at the digital classroom. The entries are in English and specially designed at different reading levels, allowing students to move easily to material of higher or lower comprehension levels as needed for K-6, middle school, and high school: Levels 1, 2, and 3 respectively. Britannica School offers an automated translation tool for over 50 languages, as well as quick dictionary definitions and audio pronunciation — helpful for English language learners.
- Britannica Escolar: Britannica Escolar provides similar content as Britannica School for K-6 and middle school in Spanish. Escolar articles are original works, not translations.
- Gale in Context: Environmental Studies: Understand environmental issues that affect people globally through topic overviews, journals, news, and multimedia content.
- Gale Presents: National Geographic Kids: Explore amazing adventures in science, nature, culture, archaeology, and space. Best for children aged 6–14.
- Gale Interactive: Science: Manipulate 3D interactive models to visualize and understand concepts in biology, chemistry, earth, and space science.
- Alexander Street: Explore professional theatre, music, dance video and audio performances, as well as thousands of world music tracks. Performance producers include: The National Theatre, Smithsonian Global Sound, The Royal Shakespeare Company, L.A. Works, Qwest (Quincy Jones) and dozens more.
- ProQuest CultureGrams: Concise cultural information on countries around the world, from basic information to perspectives on daily life and culture, including background, customs, and lifestyles of the world’s people.
- ProQuest Ebook Central: eBooks from ProQuest spanning a variety of topics.
- ProQuest SIRS Discoverer: Articles for beginning researchers, particularly elementary and middle school students. Age-appropriate content for classwork, homework and research assignments.
- ProQuest SIRS Issue Researcher: Database of complex subjects geared to middle and high school students, with a focus on current and relevant analysis of today’s most important controversial issues.
- eLibrary: General reference collection of periodicals and digital media content with guidance for beginner researchers to help them choose research topics and find authoritative information to support research claims.
Free stories online
- Brightly storytimes
- LA Public Library’s online storytime YouTube channel:
- Goodnight with Dolly -- Dolly Parton reads bedtime stories
- RIF Read Alouds
- StoryPlace offers online stories and activities for preschoolers:
- Starfall Folktales
- Author Dan Gutman reads from his series "My Weird School"
- Virtual Purple Museum
Stories by phone
Lincoln Library in Springfield, IL, offers a free dial-a-story phone: 1-217-525-5000
Tips for Reading at Home
- Read together every day. You can read the morning news at breakfast, share a story after supper, or cuddle up for a book at bedtime. A daily reading routine is something everyone can look forward to.
- Talk and build vocabulary. Interesting conversations build vocabulary, language skills, and knowledge about the world. Talk is a child’s best source of exposure to new words and ideas.
- Model reading. Kids want to do what the grownups do. Make sure your kids get to see you reading and hear you talk about it.
- Point out print. Read and talk about the words you see in the world around you. There’s lots to read—signs, recipes, cereal boxes, instruction manuals, bus schedules, news, maps, and menus.
- Visit the library. Take advantage of all the books, materials, story times, programs, and resources your local library has to offer.
- Create a reading-rich home. Find books at the bookstore or yard sales. Provide a special shelf or basket for kids to keep their own books and one for library books. Make sure there are quiet, comfortable places to read.
- Encourage your child’s reading. Praise the efforts of a soon-to-be or beginning reader. Make sure schedules of older readers include time for reading for pleasure.
- Keep books handy. Stash books in your bag to read aloud when you travel or have to wait at restaurants or for appointments. Or keep eBooks on your phone.
- Start reading traditions. Beyond bedtime stories, consider a special birthday book, holiday favorites, or a regular family read aloud night.
- Let kids choose books. Offer titles that explore your child’s interests, expand horizons, and offer exposure to different kinds of writing. Show them there are books where they can see themselves and books where they can see the worlds of others.
- Make everyone comfortable. Find a spot to read together where you are both comfortable. Sometimes kids have to move around to be comfortable.
- Be an active reader. Use expressive voices for characters, make sound effects, and point things out in the text and illustrations when you read aloud.
- Discuss what you read. Give your child enough time to absorb the story and look at the pictures as you read. Think aloud about what you are reading and looking at and encourage your child to do the same.
- Ask questions when you read. Ask your child to guess what comes next. Ask open-ended questions that help them relate to characters or events in the book. Let your child get involved and ask questions too–interruptions are okay!
- Encourage re-reading. Repetition helps kids learn. Re-reading favorite books and poems helps kids make meaningful connections between themselves and books.
- Connect reading and writing. Write your own reading material, like a story about your life, a story featuring your kids, or a story kids make up.
- Make media matter. Connect kids with appropriate technology—videos, apps, or games that help them learn new words and interesting things about the world.
- Get help. If you have concerns about your child’s language development, hearing, or vision, see your child’s pediatrician as soon as possible.
- Make reading an experience. Link life experiences with books, like a trip to the zoo and books about animals, or planting a garden and reading The Ugly Vegetables by Grace Lin.
- Have fun. Your idea of fun may differ from your child’s, so appreciate your child’s special joy for learning new things. Try different approaches, such as having them read to you or acting out a favorite story. Even something as simple as a story time outside can make reading together livelier and more memorable for you and your child.
Teachers and Parents
Library Tours and Classroom Visits
Hemet Library Tours are available on Fridays and typically last 45-60 minutes. Special story times are also available upon teacher request.
Unable to take your class to the Library? Invite the Library to visit you! We’d love to visit your classroom and share all of the resources the Library has to offer.
Contact the library for more information or to set up a tour date.
For classroom visits and tours call: 951-765-2482 or email our Children's Librarian, Jordan LaMont, at jlamont@hemetca.gov
CLASSROOM LIBRARY CARDS AVAILABLE
Classroom cards will provide your students with the opportunity to use the Hemet Public Library’s electronic resources.
Research resources and homework help
- Brainfuse: test prep and Live Homework Help, available 7 days a week from 10 am to 10pm.
- Magazines and journals:
- Cloudlibrary Newsstand
E-books & e-Audio books
- EnkiLibrary
- Cloud Library
- Hoopla
- Palace Project app
- World Book for Kids
These resources allow digital checkout and have no late fees.
ONLINE HOMEWORK HELP AND TUTORING
Try our free database: Brainfuse Homework Help Now
- Homework Help
- Interact with live TUTORS in math, science, reading/writing, social studies, PSAT/SAT, ACT, AP and state standardized tests.
- Skills-Building
- Choose state-aligned lesson and get real-time help
- Personalized eLearning Tools
- My File Sharing, My Session Replay, My Tutoring Archive, My Tests Archive, and more!
- 24-Hour Writing Lab
- Submit essays and other forms of writing for constructive feedback
- 24/7 Homework Question Center
- Submit homework questions for expert guidance
Tutors are available online from 1pm to 10pm, Monday through Sunday.
INTERNET RESOURCES: DATABASES, ENCYCLOPEDIAS, AND EBOOKS!
The Library offers many online resources to help with homework!
DATABASES
Look up journal articles on EBSCO Host to help with your reports! EBSCO Host offers "Primary Search" for elementary school students, "Middle Search Plus" for middle school students, and "MasterFILE Premier" for high school and college students. After you enter your library card number and PIN, select Magazine Articles from the left hand menu.
ENCYCLOPEDIAS
- Encyclopedia Britannica available online
- Funk and Wagnalls New World Encyclopedia is available for free, online with your Hemet library card.
EBOOKS
- California Missions: The library’s catalog and read on your computer or device!
- U.S. States: click on the link in the library’s catalog and read on your computer or device!
ABC Mouse
The award-winning ABCmouse.com curriculum is designed to help young children (ages 2 through 6 and up) build a strong foundation for future academic success. ABCmouse. com is 100% educational, with 3,500 or more learning activities across all major subject areas—reading, math, science, social studies, art, and music. Best of all, kids love it. And it’s FREE to use in this library, either on library computers or your own device as long as you are connected to the library’s WiFi!
Print from Home
With our MobilePrint Service™, you can use your personal computer or mobile device to print to the library’s printers from anywhere. Simply submit documents for printing and come to the library to release and pick up your document.
How to print from a laptop or desktop computer at home or work:
- visit: PrinterOn
- Select the printer and enter your email address.
- Browse your computer to find and select the file you wish to print.
- Click the green print icon (you will see the status of your print job and a reference number).
- At the Print Release Station in the library, select "Release a Print Job".
- Enter the email address you supplied and select your print job.
- Your print job will be available for 48 hours after you send it!
- Black and White copies available for $0.15 per page.
- Color copies available for $0.35 per page.