2023 Children’s Book Council of Australia (CBCA) Book of the Year Awards

Last Friday August 18th, the winners of the Children’s Book Council of Australia Book of the Year Awards were announced.

And the winners are…

The Book of the Year: Younger Readers

Winner: Runt ~ Craig Silvey

Honours: Evie and Rhino ~ Neridah McMullin

Honours: The Raven’s Song ~ Zana Fraillon & Bren MacDibble

The Book of the Year: Early Childhood

Winner: Where The Lyrebird Lives ~ Vikki Conley, ill. Max Hamilton

Honours: Bev and Kev ~ Katrina Germein, ill. Mandy Foot

Honours: Snap! ~ Anna Walker

Picture Book of the Year

Winner: My Strange Shrinking Parents ~ Zeno Sworder

Honours: Dirt by Sea ~ Tom Jellett, text. Michael Wagner

Honours: Paradise Sands: A Story of Enchantment ~ Levi Pinfold

The Eve Pownall Award

Winner: DEEP: Dive into Hidden Worlds ~ Jess McGeachin

Honours: Come Together: Things Every Aussie Kid Should Know about the First Peoples ~ Isaiah Firebrace ill. Jaelyn Biumaiwai

Honours: Wild Australian Life ~ Leonard Cronin, ill. Chris Nixon

CBCA Award for New Illustrator

Winner: Tiny Wonders ~ ill. Sally Soweol Han

Should you wish to view the announcement of the award winners, you may do so by clicking the link https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ce5xpWvFBt4

2023 Book Week

This week is Book Week! Right across Australia, we are celebrating reading and the very best of Australian authors and illustrators, and, the Children’s Book Council of Australia announce the Books of the Year (listed above).

This year we will be celebrating with our annual Book Fair and Book Character Parade.

Book Week – Book Fair

This year our annual Book Fair will be held in Week 6 (August 21 – 25, this week)! The students have had the opportunity to browse through the selection of books available to them and complete their book wish list last Thursday/Friday in their class library time. Hopefully, their wish list made it home and you were able to view and discuss with your child their selection.

Should you wish to purchase a book you may do this in one of two ways -

1) make a secure credit card payment online OR

2) send the money into school in a sealed and labelled envelope or zip lock bag on either Tuesday August 22nd, Wednesday August 23rd, Thursday August 24th or Friday August 25th for them to purchase their books.

Student Wish List and Instructions On How To Pay Online

Please ensure your child’s wish list accompanies the payment receipt or cash when collecting their books from the Book Fair.

The Book Fair will be open for business Tuesday August 22nd, Wednesday August 23rd, Thursday August 24th before school, and during the first and second break times or on Friday August 25th during first break.

Photos have been taken of the books available for purchase and posted on our school Facebook page for your viewing. Should the book your child wishes to purchase sell out, be assured that I am able to place an order for their chosen book, which means they will still receive it but at a later date (usually the following week). By purchasing from the Book Fair, apart from taking home some wonderful stories to share with your family, you help our school earn credits with Scholastic, which enables us to purchase more resources for our school.

If you would like to take a sneak peek at the book fair with a view to making some Christmas/birthday purchases, please email me to arrange a convenient time for you to visit mholley@arm.catholic.edu.au

As always your participation in the Book Fair is entirely voluntary.

Book Week - Book Character Parade

This year our Book Character Parade will be held on Thursday, 25th August, commencing at 10.00am and parents, grandparents and friends are most welcome to join us to view the parade. Students may come to school dressed in their costume (please ensure your child knows the name of their book character and which book they are from); however, if your child chooses not to come dressed as a book character, school uniform must be worn. Please ensure that clothing is appropriate for the weather conditions and the school environment and that appropriate footwear is worn (enclosed shoes – no heels or thongs). Students must wear their school hats on the day. If alternate hats and shoes are required to complete your child’s costume, please bring them to school in a separate bag and they may be worn just for the parade. Any props that may prove dangerous, for example swords etc, please secure them in a separate bag and ask your child to hand them to the class teacher for safe keeping.

After the parade please stay and join your child/ren for morning tea in the playground.

Our annual Book Character Parade is an exciting and fun way of celebrating books and sharing our love of books with the whole school community, hope to see you there!

2023 Premier's Reading Challenge - Closed

The Premier’s Reading Challenge for 2023 has now concluded. A huge congratulations to all students who have completed the Premier’s Reading Challenge this year – WELL DONE! All entries submitted so far have been validated, if you haven’t already done so could you please make sure you have your reading log up to date and submitted so your entry can be validated.

Remember that the books you read after the Premier’s Reading Challenge closes this year can count towards next year’s Premier’s Reading Challenge. So why not get an early start and begin your 2024 Premier's Reading Challenge journey now?

Important Dates for Term 3

21st - 25th August Book Week 2023
21st - 25th August St Joseph’s Book Fair
25th August Book Week Character Parade

Reading at Home

The students at St Joseph’s are able to access ebooks, audiobooks and magazine through SORA, the Armidale Diocese digital library. SORA has an extensive collection of ebooks, audiobooks and magazines for students of all ages.

Instructions for logging onto SORA are as follows:

SORA

Getting started with Sora

Sora - get free ebooks and audiobooks from your school.

Step 1: Install the SORA app from Apple App Store or Google Play Store, or soraapp.com.

Step 2: When in SORA, click on I have a setup code, then sign in.

The “setup” code is cenetau

Sign into your School – Select ACEN from the dropdown box.

Step 3: Browse the explore tab and borrow a book. Your book will open so you can start reading right away.

Step 4: Close the book and go to the shelf to see all your books. From there, you can:

Select Open book or Open audiobook to read or listen to the book.
Select Options to renew or return the book and more.

© 2020 OverDrive, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

You will need to use your school username and password to access this.

WORLD BOOK ONLINE

St Joseph’s also has a subscription to World Book Online! This means that our students have access to this wonderful resource free of charge should they wish to access it from home. World Book Online may be accessed via the Oliver home page or by visiting the World Book website www.worldbookonline.com

World Book Online is a safe, trusted, 21st-century learning environment for students.

The World Book products our school has access to include:

Kids: simple navigation, easy to read articles, translations and text to speech (with 10 voices). It includes educational games, activities, science experiments, a dictionary, an atlas, interactive maps, map outlines and a tool for comparing places or animals.

Student: expansive reference database and multimedia library. It includes games, behind the headlines, citation builder and research tools.

Timelines: over 650 timelines including Gold Rushes in Australia, Australian Prime Ministers, Cricket World Cup, Star Wars and Harry Potter. Edit or create your own timelines.

Our User ID: joseph2340

Password: joseph2340

Photo Gallery

A splash of colour