I couldn’t possibly hit on everything I wanted to in my recap on Kid Lit Con, and I thought it would be worthwhile to talk about some of the really cool things I learned about at the conference that others might be interested in checking out. These range from books about critical reviewing to collaborative blogs to a site working to raise awareness of issues of diversity in our daily lives.

Microaggressions — This website, built upon a Tumblr set up, examines the small instances of everyday discrimination. It’s a fascinating website of experiences, and it highlights a lot of what the conference’s diversity panel aimed to talk about.

Stages on Pages — This is not only a website devoted to young adult books that feature performing arts, but it’s also an actual author tour. Unfortunately for those of us who don’t reside on a coast, the tour won’t be visiting us, but the resources on the website will be invaluable for many. There will also soon be a teacher’s guide available.

Transmedia Experiences — I’m sad I didn’t get the chance to attend this session which explored the idea of transmedia. For those who aren’t familiar, transmedia, in its most basic form, takes something that’s static (like a book) and opens up possibilities for further world exploration and involvement via digital means. Easy examples are projects like Pottermore. At KidLitCon, one of the presentations on transmedia was Angelpunk, which is worth exploring to get an idea of what this melding of technology into literacy can look like.

Authors are Rockstars — Like podcasts? Like author interviews? Check out this fabulous podcast by two librarians in southern California. I’m not a podcast listener, but these ladies have certainly piqued my interest in listening.

Streamlining Your Presence — I’m obsessed with streamlining and with knowledge management (which is a fancy term for keeping your non-tangible things in order). During one of the sessions, NetVibes was mentioned as a tool for bringing together all your social networking interests together in one dashboard. I haven’t tried it, but it looks like it’d be worth exploring.

Altruism and Literacy — I think what this year’s KidLitCon organizers did to team up with Reading Is Fundamental (RIF) is perhaps one of the smartest moves they could make. Through donations and a small percentage of book sales at the convention, RIF earned $1,700. That, I believe they said, would go toward purchasing nearly 800 books for needy kids. During the conference, I learned about a list of causes devoted to literacy and putting books into the hands of children, including Books for Kids, First Book, and more. As advocates for reading as bloggers and librarians are, these are resources worth knowing and worth supporting.

Critical Reviews — Admittedly, I haven’t had the chance to delve into some of the post-panel feedback I got through the #KidLitCon tag on Twitter, but I did find a couple of comments about places where one can learn more about the art of the critical review. There’s an essay here about the value of the critical exploration of text, and someone dropped a comment about K. T. Horning’s From Cover to Cover. These look like fantastic resources and I’m eager to dive into them both.