Teen Tech Week kicks off Sunday, March 8 and runs for a week at libraries around the country. During the week, libraries will hold special events and programs designed to give teens exposure to, and hands-on experience with, digital literacy and technology-related services and activities.
This annual event is hosted by Young Adult Library Services Association (YALSA) and is sponsored by Best Buy. Â YALSA holds this event to make teens aware of the digital resources and services available to help them succeed in school and prepare them for college and jobs.
Thousands of libraries organize these programs, so there’s a good chance a library near you is holding an event. It’s up to the library to design their own activities. For example, Homer Township Public Library (Homer Glen, IL), a grant recipient of YALSA’s Teen Tech Week, is offering a terrific line-up of tech activities for teens (grades 6-12) that includes making electronics with littleBits, building a robot with Cubelets, learning to program in Python, and learning to make action video photography with the mountable GoPro camera. The range of classes from electronics and robotics to programming and videography is impressive and will definitely appeal to teens.
In my own backyard, the Boston Public Library has got a great mix of creative activities planned for teens across a number of their branches including Copley Square, Grove Hall, Dudley, East Boston, Hyde Park, and Mattapan. Programs consist of using Tinkercad to design a 3D model, creating robots with toothbrushes, Scratch programming, and making notebooks from recycled floppy disks, to name a few.  Click the following link to see the full list of programs: Boston Public Library Teen Tech Week.
Libraries are a great source of free technology programming for teens and many offer events throughout the year. If you’re interested in Teen Tech Week, visit your library’s website to see if they are hosting activities in March. You can generally find events in the “Teen” section of the website or by clicking on the library’s event calendar. If you don’t see anything at your library, expand your options and do a Google search to include libraries in your local area.
Image Source: Young Adult Library Services Association
