This morning I shared this article on my other jobs FB page. My other job is marking library student assessments for TAFE. So I shared the article with students.
Along with the article, I asked the students this: Discussion about public libraries often leads to phrases like community hub etc. Do you think the same applies in academic, special, and school libraries?
The students must be busy people because as yet there have been no replies. However, I am open for those reading my blog to discuss and perhaps share a comment on FB, twitter or here on the blog comments.
When I used to work in academic libraries, pre-child, the campus was my community. My coworkers were my community. Those that used the library were my community. I put this down to the campus being the main place I was spending my time.
Yes I would do my shopping etc outside of the campus, back in the suburb I lived in. But I never felt the suburb was my community until I had my daughter, went on maternity leave and started spending more time in my suburb. I stared interacting with more than the check out person at the grocery store. I attended the community nurse sessions, baby rhyme time, mother's group and the list goes on. Suddenly, I was interacting, meeting and becoming friends with people who lived in my own suburb!! In my community!!
This brings me back to the original question - do academic, special and school libraries build communities? Or have their own communities?
They all provide spaces for people to gather. They provide different programs for people to attend as groups or individuals. But do they build communities and if so what sort of communities?
I will leave this open for some discussion (I hope)!
Today's mantra: Your body deserves the best
In my case lately, my body has been having the best chocolate!! 8-)
Showing posts with label school. Show all posts
Showing posts with label school. Show all posts
Tuesday, June 9, 2015
Saturday, March 9, 2013
Just Google It - Continued
I had to do a follow up post to my last post because I think it is important to share what has happened since gaining approval to run sessions with the students as Miss A's school.
The school had organised library visits for the year 2/3, 3/4 and 5/6 classes. However, the weather had other ideas and due to the extreme conditions, I said that I could visit the classes at the school rather than have the students walk to the library in the horizontal rain and wind.
At these visits, I had the students divide into their project questions/topics. I provided each group some butchers paper and different covered felt pens (textas). I then asked the students to label the paper with their project topic and write all the words and questions they could think of when it came to their topic. E.g. for those doing shipwrecks they put ship, boat, rocks, storm, where did the boat/ship come from?, what was the boat/ship carrying?, where was the ship/boat going? etc.
I then handed out a kids guide to Dewey Decimal Classification that I had modified to be more Australian.
We went through how the Dewey Decimal Classification worked using a comparision with supermarket shopping and how all the fruit and vegetables are together and all the meat is together and all the bread is together, etc.
I then asked them to look at their words on their butchers paper and go through the Dewey Decimal Classification handout and write down any Dewey Decimal numbers that they thought matched their words.
By this time, I had run out of time with them - I only had half an hour with each class. But the end product was butchers paper full of keywords and possible Dewey Decimal numbers they could go to when visiting the library.
Luckily for me, the teachers arranged for library visits once the weather had cleared.
During the library visit, I gave a quick tour of the library. We then sat down and I asked what parts of a book they could look at to find out if the book would have anything about their topic. The students were really cluey about this and all could answer - the blurb at the back, the contents page and the index.
I had put aside books to do with their topics and made sure they couldn't be loaned to allow all students equal access to the resources. We all know what can happen if you have one student or parent of a student who is quick of the mark and borrows all the books about a particular topic resulting in the other students having access to nothing.
The students were then allowed to look through the books and photocopy (for free) any pages they thought that would help then with their projects - with a limit of 10 pages!
All in all it has been a success. The teachers were really impressed and have already talked to me about making this a regular thing.
The principal even put a small article in the school newsletter talking about the partnership with the school and local library and how wonderful it was for the students to learn about how they can access learning resources from a place within their community outside of school.
Now all I have to do is continue working on the other 6 primary schools and 2 high schools in our region - which I have been hammering away at since I started in this job 5 years ago.
The school had organised library visits for the year 2/3, 3/4 and 5/6 classes. However, the weather had other ideas and due to the extreme conditions, I said that I could visit the classes at the school rather than have the students walk to the library in the horizontal rain and wind.
At these visits, I had the students divide into their project questions/topics. I provided each group some butchers paper and different covered felt pens (textas). I then asked the students to label the paper with their project topic and write all the words and questions they could think of when it came to their topic. E.g. for those doing shipwrecks they put ship, boat, rocks, storm, where did the boat/ship come from?, what was the boat/ship carrying?, where was the ship/boat going? etc.
I then handed out a kids guide to Dewey Decimal Classification that I had modified to be more Australian.
We went through how the Dewey Decimal Classification worked using a comparision with supermarket shopping and how all the fruit and vegetables are together and all the meat is together and all the bread is together, etc.
I then asked them to look at their words on their butchers paper and go through the Dewey Decimal Classification handout and write down any Dewey Decimal numbers that they thought matched their words.
By this time, I had run out of time with them - I only had half an hour with each class. But the end product was butchers paper full of keywords and possible Dewey Decimal numbers they could go to when visiting the library.
Luckily for me, the teachers arranged for library visits once the weather had cleared.
During the library visit, I gave a quick tour of the library. We then sat down and I asked what parts of a book they could look at to find out if the book would have anything about their topic. The students were really cluey about this and all could answer - the blurb at the back, the contents page and the index.
I had put aside books to do with their topics and made sure they couldn't be loaned to allow all students equal access to the resources. We all know what can happen if you have one student or parent of a student who is quick of the mark and borrows all the books about a particular topic resulting in the other students having access to nothing.
The students were then allowed to look through the books and photocopy (for free) any pages they thought that would help then with their projects - with a limit of 10 pages!
All in all it has been a success. The teachers were really impressed and have already talked to me about making this a regular thing.
The principal even put a small article in the school newsletter talking about the partnership with the school and local library and how wonderful it was for the students to learn about how they can access learning resources from a place within their community outside of school.
Now all I have to do is continue working on the other 6 primary schools and 2 high schools in our region - which I have been hammering away at since I started in this job 5 years ago.
Monday, February 18, 2013
Just Google It
Last week, Miss A came home with her first project. Miss A is in year 2 this year but has been put in a year 2/3 class so instead of continuing stage 1 work (Kindy-2), she is now doing stage 2 work (yrs 3-4). I'm in mixed minds about this but I'm not focusing on this in today's blog post.
Back to the project. So this is the project:
During each Term this year you will be given an outline for a project to work on at home. The projects will be linked to that Term's theme in HSIE. While not compulsory, we hope you will take these opportunities to further develop valuable skills in research and presentation.
Our theme in Term 1 is early Australian history: sea exploration, reasons for colonisation, and first settlement.
For this Term's project you should choose one of the following:
Back to the project. So this is the project:
During each Term this year you will be given an outline for a project to work on at home. The projects will be linked to that Term's theme in HSIE. While not compulsory, we hope you will take these opportunities to further develop valuable skills in research and presentation.
Our theme in Term 1 is early Australian history: sea exploration, reasons for colonisation, and first settlement.
For this Term's project you should choose one of the following:
- A biography of a convict. This can be any convict who became well-known, e.g. Francis Greenway, James Ruse, John Cadman. If you know you have a convict as an ancestor, you can do your project on him or her.
- A famous shipwreck, e.g. Batavia, Vergulde Draeck, Zuytdorp or Trial (there are two - one in WA and another at South West Rocks)
- This year is the bicentenary of the crossing of the Blue Mountains by Blaxland, Wentworth and Lawson in 1813. Explain why it took 35 years to find a way over the mountains west of Sydney, and why it was so important for the colony of NSW.
And it goes on to explain how the project is to be presented.
Imagine my shock when Miss A told me that the teacher (not her teacher) explaining the project told them to use Google. I asked - did they mention books, the school library, the public library?? She said no.
So like any good mother, I visited her teacher and mentioned that I wasn't very happy that the students were told to use Google and I'd happily offer the students a session on how to find information in the public library - which is just down the road from the school.
This week I'm providing "how to find information" sessions for the year 2/3's, 3/4's and 5/6's from my daughter's school.
Now I don't dismiss having students use Google to find information. But I do get disappointed when there is no explanation on how to define what they should be looking for, no discussion of keywords, no discussion of how to evaluate the information found, and no discussion of the other research tools and resources that could be used.
I also find it disappointing that the school librarian is not insisting on offering "how to find information" sessions to the students.
I understand that there can be many reasons why this doesn't happen - lack of funds, lack of support by the teachers, lack of time etc etc. But what if I my daughter was not at this school? Who else would jump in and ask that the students be given the opportunity to be taught these skills? Especially since the project states that it is allowing the students to further develop their research skills - well how about giving them research skills to develop instead of giving a project without the basic support to get them started?
Even if the school had not agreed to allow the students to come to the library, Miss A would still be provided with a lesson in finding information from me - but what about the other students?
And I'm trying very hard not to think about the other schools in our area that are also not providing their students with the basic start in finding information.
What are your thoughts on this?
Tuesday, December 11, 2012
Blog December Post 12 - It's one of those days
I must admit, I'm a bit stumped about what to write today.
I could ask those that read this blog - what would you like to see me write about?
Anyway, instead I will bore you with how frustrating my day was yesterday. You may remember that I predicted that this week would be stressful. It makes me wonder why I take leave, as when I return there is so much work to do. And I had only 3 days off this time!!
So yesterday was frustrating for a number of reasons but I suppose I really can't go into them because some are political, and some regard the lack of space on the shelves for books which is causing me no end of frustration as I have weeded and weeded and weeded - so I may just have to purchase new shelves which is not an easy task at this time of year.
I also ended the day with another one of our public computers going stupid. And due to our limited IT staff, I know we will most likely have to wait a while before it is fixed - with school holidays coming up it will cause extra stress filling bookings - can't wait to get a computer booking system.
Then I got home and found that we have only received one calendar that my daughter had made at school (the students draw a picture and then they put it on a calendar) when I had ordered 3. So today I have to chase up the school about it.
They had the school presentation "night" on yesterday "afternoon" at 5.30pm. My bug bear about that is what about parents that work - I don't get home till around 6pm so never get to go to school functions. Yes I could have tried to leave early but as mentioned above, yesterday was one of those days where that wasn't going to happen - unfortunately, most days are like that.
Then my last bug bear of the day was when I ordered some books from a particular online ebook shop and they are in ePub format. However, they won't load onto Bluefire Reader on my tablet. All other ePub books from other online shops do but not from this shop - the files come across as ACSM (I think that is the file format). I am stumped and I can add that to another ebook frustration of mine!
So let's all toast our coffees, teas or milos to a better day today!!
I could ask those that read this blog - what would you like to see me write about?
Anyway, instead I will bore you with how frustrating my day was yesterday. You may remember that I predicted that this week would be stressful. It makes me wonder why I take leave, as when I return there is so much work to do. And I had only 3 days off this time!!
So yesterday was frustrating for a number of reasons but I suppose I really can't go into them because some are political, and some regard the lack of space on the shelves for books which is causing me no end of frustration as I have weeded and weeded and weeded - so I may just have to purchase new shelves which is not an easy task at this time of year.
I also ended the day with another one of our public computers going stupid. And due to our limited IT staff, I know we will most likely have to wait a while before it is fixed - with school holidays coming up it will cause extra stress filling bookings - can't wait to get a computer booking system.
Then I got home and found that we have only received one calendar that my daughter had made at school (the students draw a picture and then they put it on a calendar) when I had ordered 3. So today I have to chase up the school about it.
They had the school presentation "night" on yesterday "afternoon" at 5.30pm. My bug bear about that is what about parents that work - I don't get home till around 6pm so never get to go to school functions. Yes I could have tried to leave early but as mentioned above, yesterday was one of those days where that wasn't going to happen - unfortunately, most days are like that.
Then my last bug bear of the day was when I ordered some books from a particular online ebook shop and they are in ePub format. However, they won't load onto Bluefire Reader on my tablet. All other ePub books from other online shops do but not from this shop - the files come across as ACSM (I think that is the file format). I am stumped and I can add that to another ebook frustration of mine!
So let's all toast our coffees, teas or milos to a better day today!!
Thursday, March 15, 2012
Butterfly Wings
I hope this post does not turn out to be thought of me boasting about my child's achievements - because I'm certainly not out to do that. However, I just have to share what I feel is a result of a program I was involved in back in my maternity leave days.
Butterfly Wings is a program that I ended up being involved with while on maternity leave with my daughter. I was attending a local playgroup hosted by the local community health centre. My memory gets a bit thin here - mummy brain - but I think they asked if anyone was interested in attending some training to become facilitators of an under 2's literacy and numeracy development program. Coming from a librarian background, I jumped at the chance and attended the training.
Gwen and Lisa are inspirational trainers and so passionate about their program it wasn't hard to get excited and enjoy learning. The thing that stuck out for me the most was a slide they showed of the brain size of a child who had been interacted with by their carers and one who hadn't. The size difference was amazing. As you may have guessed, the child who had interaction had a large brain from absorbing all that information, and the child who was neglected had a very small brain. If anything, this slide highlighted the importance of bonding with your child.
Once I became a facilitator, another mum from our group who also did the training and I sought funding to run the program at the Community Health centre. Not long after we were also approached to run it at the Gailes Neighbourhood House. These centres were in low socio-economic areas so funding for literacy and numeracy development was important.
Now I could go on and on about how good the program is - and I recommend my library friends check out the website I linked to above and follow up with Gwen and Lisa about some training for your library staff - but it is the impact it is having now on my child that I want to share.
When I shared this with Gwen, she said she shed a tear but said it was really my bonding with my child that is the cause of this - not necessarilly Butterfly Wings - I think it is a mix of both.
My daughter participated in the Butterfly Wings program from 6mths of age. I had also been reading to her since she was born - something that I highly recommend. You might feel a little silly and they may not always like it - but most of the time they love hearing your voice.
My daughter is now in the advanced reading group in her class, she is writing some wonderful imaginative stories and she speaks very well (we often get comments about this). I feel that a lot of this has happened due to the Butterfly Wings program and the time we spent together singing songs, doing interactive rhyme and sharing stories.
I hope that the other mums that participated in the program are sharing similar stories because I just feel that this program - and others similar to it - give our children the best start in life and it would be really interesting to do some research to show the statistics or evidence that those children who participate in programs such as Butterfly Wings do perform better later in school life!!
Butterfly Wings is a program that I ended up being involved with while on maternity leave with my daughter. I was attending a local playgroup hosted by the local community health centre. My memory gets a bit thin here - mummy brain - but I think they asked if anyone was interested in attending some training to become facilitators of an under 2's literacy and numeracy development program. Coming from a librarian background, I jumped at the chance and attended the training.
Gwen and Lisa are inspirational trainers and so passionate about their program it wasn't hard to get excited and enjoy learning. The thing that stuck out for me the most was a slide they showed of the brain size of a child who had been interacted with by their carers and one who hadn't. The size difference was amazing. As you may have guessed, the child who had interaction had a large brain from absorbing all that information, and the child who was neglected had a very small brain. If anything, this slide highlighted the importance of bonding with your child.
Once I became a facilitator, another mum from our group who also did the training and I sought funding to run the program at the Community Health centre. Not long after we were also approached to run it at the Gailes Neighbourhood House. These centres were in low socio-economic areas so funding for literacy and numeracy development was important.
Now I could go on and on about how good the program is - and I recommend my library friends check out the website I linked to above and follow up with Gwen and Lisa about some training for your library staff - but it is the impact it is having now on my child that I want to share.
When I shared this with Gwen, she said she shed a tear but said it was really my bonding with my child that is the cause of this - not necessarilly Butterfly Wings - I think it is a mix of both.
My daughter participated in the Butterfly Wings program from 6mths of age. I had also been reading to her since she was born - something that I highly recommend. You might feel a little silly and they may not always like it - but most of the time they love hearing your voice.
My daughter is now in the advanced reading group in her class, she is writing some wonderful imaginative stories and she speaks very well (we often get comments about this). I feel that a lot of this has happened due to the Butterfly Wings program and the time we spent together singing songs, doing interactive rhyme and sharing stories.
I hope that the other mums that participated in the program are sharing similar stories because I just feel that this program - and others similar to it - give our children the best start in life and it would be really interesting to do some research to show the statistics or evidence that those children who participate in programs such as Butterfly Wings do perform better later in school life!!
Thursday, February 2, 2012
Library Day in the Life - Post #4
Again I'm posting a bit late - sorry!!
Due to the flooding, our local steiner school booked the library to be used as makeshift classrooms. So approximately 30 odd (down a bit on yesterdays estimate) students and three teachers entered the library at 9.30am an hour before official opening. I also had to make a quick visit to our "web developer" to obtain an electronic copy of our Council logo to be sent to the company who is making our NYR12 pull up banners.
I got on with the opening duties - running notices, delivering mail, buying the newspaper, returning items and shelving. All I can say is thank goodness I had one of my volunteers with me today to assist with the shelving as it was a constant stream at the circulation desk.
Once the shelving was complete, I got my volunteer to start selecting books for the blind date books we are having during Library Lovers Day and the following weeks. These books are then wrapped in brown paper (with the accession number on the outside) and placed on display for selection from our brave borrowers who have no idea what they are selecting. It was successful last year and we hope again this year.
Some of the steiner students were looking for books on Rome - so I assisted them - and was happy to see their teacher teaching them the ins and outs of searching the catalogue. A few were lazy and went direct to me but the majority did it themselves.
At 12.30pm I closed the library for lunch (as there is only one staff member on and my volunteer finished for the day) and headed to the pool for my lunch time laps. I had to take it easy today due to a calf cramp I suffered on Tuesday seems to have resulted in a slightly pulled muscle - so I only managed 44 laps compared to my 50.
Back from lunch to a crowd of people waiting to get in to the library. Most wanting to use computers or wifi. I went back to returning, shelving and serving at the circulation desk. As I mentioned before - constant stream.
Later in the afternoon one of the organisers of the Bellingen Readers and Writers Festival came by with more programs and another room booking request for the library. The Library will be hosting a number of sessions leading up to and during the festival. I love supporting the festival as it not only means seeing a number of excellent presentations by authors, but many people enter the library who would not necessarily visit otherwise.
I then had a moment to catch up on emails, check some facebook and twitter updates and then it was time for closing. A quick check of the gate count revealed over 350 people passed through the door - no wonder I didn't stop!! It may not be much for a big branch but when there is only one person manning (womanning) the library then it's a big deal.
I packed up the books to take to the branch close to home and locked up. Once at the other branch I exchanged books and took the ones for our branch and headed home.
Due to the flooding, our local steiner school booked the library to be used as makeshift classrooms. So approximately 30 odd (down a bit on yesterdays estimate) students and three teachers entered the library at 9.30am an hour before official opening. I also had to make a quick visit to our "web developer" to obtain an electronic copy of our Council logo to be sent to the company who is making our NYR12 pull up banners.
I got on with the opening duties - running notices, delivering mail, buying the newspaper, returning items and shelving. All I can say is thank goodness I had one of my volunteers with me today to assist with the shelving as it was a constant stream at the circulation desk.
Once the shelving was complete, I got my volunteer to start selecting books for the blind date books we are having during Library Lovers Day and the following weeks. These books are then wrapped in brown paper (with the accession number on the outside) and placed on display for selection from our brave borrowers who have no idea what they are selecting. It was successful last year and we hope again this year.
Some of the steiner students were looking for books on Rome - so I assisted them - and was happy to see their teacher teaching them the ins and outs of searching the catalogue. A few were lazy and went direct to me but the majority did it themselves.
At 12.30pm I closed the library for lunch (as there is only one staff member on and my volunteer finished for the day) and headed to the pool for my lunch time laps. I had to take it easy today due to a calf cramp I suffered on Tuesday seems to have resulted in a slightly pulled muscle - so I only managed 44 laps compared to my 50.
Back from lunch to a crowd of people waiting to get in to the library. Most wanting to use computers or wifi. I went back to returning, shelving and serving at the circulation desk. As I mentioned before - constant stream.
Later in the afternoon one of the organisers of the Bellingen Readers and Writers Festival came by with more programs and another room booking request for the library. The Library will be hosting a number of sessions leading up to and during the festival. I love supporting the festival as it not only means seeing a number of excellent presentations by authors, but many people enter the library who would not necessarily visit otherwise.
I then had a moment to catch up on emails, check some facebook and twitter updates and then it was time for closing. A quick check of the gate count revealed over 350 people passed through the door - no wonder I didn't stop!! It may not be much for a big branch but when there is only one person manning (womanning) the library then it's a big deal.
I packed up the books to take to the branch close to home and locked up. Once at the other branch I exchanged books and took the ones for our branch and headed home.
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