4th April School Librarian Day

It is School Librarian Day! Great! There should be one, but it should say School Teacher Librarian Day so that it acknowledges the difference between what a librarian does and what a school librarian might do that is different from the usual job description of a librarian.

There are masses of picture books celebrating libraries,  librarians and their virtues and they start with a very young audience. See Lola at the Library and Carlo and the Really Nice Librarian, but there's not as many that celebrate librarians in a school setting.


My Library has two series and really the school teacher librarian is a bit 'scary' in both.
There's The Library Dragon by Carmen Agra Deedy where Miss Lotta Scales is a dragon who protects the Sunrise Elementary School's library books from the children, but when she realises the books are meant to be read, she turns into Miss Lotty, librarian and storyteller. I have a doll of the dragon who when turned upside down and her dress is repositioned turns into Miss Lotty. The students like the doll more than the stories but are happy to borrow the book in order to take the doll! In the sequel Return of the Library Dragon, just as in real schools now, someone orders that the books in the library could go and be replaced by computers. Miss Lotty bursts into a fiery rage in order to ensure that the books will remain and children will be able to READ. This book's story creates 'fiery' discussions among the students.

 The other series about a school librarian, Mrs Skorupski and her fourth grade class, starts with Our Librarian Won't Tell Us Anything. It is written by Toni Buzzeo who is a School Teacher Librarian. There are four books in the series covering all aspects of her job. To all my fellow teacher librarians have a wonderful day!

While weeding the shelves, I found another teacher librarian this week in Mary Ann Fraser's series about I.Q. the pet mouse in Mrs Furber's classroom. In I.Q.Goes to the Library the class go off to the school library and Mrs Binder the teacher librarian introduces the class to all that is on offer at the library.

School Libraries Matter

13th January Preparing for Chinese New Year

The movable celebration of Chinese New Year this year starts on  28th January and it is the Year of the Rooster. I began thinking about 'rooster' picture books. There's not a huge number, but what there is, have some very interesting roosters as characters. They don't all fit the Chinese rooster who is   "...very observant, hardworking, resourceful, courageous, and talented. Roosters are very confident in themselves", but they make interesting reading and should create lively discussions. There are books about the Chinese Zodiac which will include information about the rooster, but the best book is probably The Magical Rooster. This book is part of the series on the Chinese Zodiac animals by Li Jian. His books are beautiful, informative, bilingual and a big hit in my library with native Chinese speakers and Anglo children alike.

Then take a tangent and look at how roosters are portrayed in picture books. Could we use the same adjectives for these book characters? Start with the rooster in The Bremen Town Musicians who started off as a reject but ends up triumphant. The rooster and his friends were certainly resourceful and courageous.

The cockerel or rooster in Helen Ward's book The Rooster and the Fox (the book exists with two titles depending upon where it was published) is vain and self centred, but also triumphs by being courageous and resourceful. This is a beautiful book based on Chaucer's Chanticleer story.

Henry, the rooster in Chris Wormell's story, Henry and the Fox  cannot crow, is a squib and not at all confident, but with help manages to appear heroic. 

Eric Carle's rooster in Rooster's Off to See the World is adventurous and confident and keen to travel. He heads up an expedition with friends but makes no provisions for food or shelter so his friends leave him. What does he do then?

Rooster's Revenge  is part 3 of a series of wordless books by Beatrice Rodriguez which started with The Chicken Thief. Rooster and his friends leave the chicken to go home but get caught in a storm at sea. Which adjectives would you use to describe him?

The other titles below, Kip, Bob and  The Rooster Who Would Not Be Quiet all explore the noise that roosters make and whether it is appropriate for where they live. If you can find them in your library they are fun to read and make good readalouds with young children. Last year when Year 1 and I were looking at stereotypes in traditional stories with chickens and foxes we made lists of adjectives for characters and had a substantial list for roosters. Because in many traditional tales a rooster is referred to as a 'cock', one boy suddenly said "now I know where the word 'cocky' comes from". Most children had never heard the word so this comment started a whole new vocabulary discussion. It was impromptu, but fantastic and the students will remember the word 'cocky'.

Happy New Year. One more week and I'll be back at school... thinking about getting as many books off those shelves and into readers' hands as possible.

 

28th April Screen Free Day

Screen Free Day (Week) - what a good idea! This is a day (or week) when you choose to turn off all screens that are part of your everyday life...your mobile, your computer, your iPad, your television, your game console etc.

Sometimes I wish I could manage the library without a computer and then we have a blackout or some problem and I have to write all the loans down and enter them manually later and it is such a chore so I know I don't really want to. However it would be nice not to read email or do research on a computer just for a day, to turn off when you leave work, so here's our chance. Turn off and read a book, or go outside, explore in the dirt, run, stroll on the beach...dream. All of the books above and those here will inspire you to

  If you don't know the Library Dragon books by Carmen Agra Deedy search out the second one Return of the Library Dragon. Every librarian needs this book! Miss Lotty, the book-reading librarian is retiring and she is to be replaced by Mike Krochip and computers. All the books are gone. There are some beautiful one-liners on why the books should be returned and the endpapers have the best 'book' quotes. It  ends with "but our kids need a library where they can UNPLUG, for the love of books." My library hasn't any computers for the children to use except the one used as an inquiry terminal, so when the children are in the library they are unplugged and choose to READ.

“What information consumes is rather obvious: it consumes the attention of its recipients. Hence, a wealth of information creates a poverty of attention and a need to allocate that attention efficiently among the overabundance of information sources that might consume it.” — HERBERT SIMON, recipient of Nobel Memorial Prize in Economics.

“Children need to experience the real world, not just media world. Make this week the beginning of that experience.” Dr Mike Brody