Library Corner
Library News
There are plenty of exciting things happening in the Glen Eira College library this term. We welcome new librarian Miss Karys McEwen, who joins us full of enthusiasm for the year ahead. The Book Club has started up once again, and this year will meet fortnightly on Wednesdays at lunchtime to discuss a shared love of reading and recommend books to one another. Our Homework Help sessions allow students to work with teachers and volunteer tutors after school on Tuesdays and Wednesdays. The library also hosted a VCE Library Q&A session, where all VCE students learnt about the resources and services offered to them, and had their questions answered. In other news, our library technician Mrs Megan Gatt has been busy cataloguing many of the latest books so that they’re ready for you to borrow, and the library staff are always keen to make suggestions or chat about what students and staff are reading. Board games are still available to use at lunchtime and after school, and comic fans should keep an eye out for our new Graphic Novel collection, coming soon to a shelf near you. And that’s just the start! The library is abuzz as always, and we look forward to a great beginning to 2017.
Karys McEwen
College Librarian
Traits of Writing
Year 7 is an important year for student’s literacy growth. It is where their reading and writing skills from primary school are reinforced and built upon for successful future learning. With this in mind, Glen Eira College is introducing the Traits of Writing for Year 7 students.
The six traits are;
- Ideas: the writing’s content
- Organisation: the internal structure of the piece
- Voice: the tone and tenor of the writing
- Word Choice: the vocabulary the writer uses to convey meaning
- Sentence Fluency: the way words and phrases flow through the writing
- Conventions: the mechanical correctness of the writing (spelling, capitalisation, punctuation, paragraphing, grammar)
Students who are already proficient writers will help gain an understanding of where their strengths are and students who struggle with writing will help gain confidence in the writing process. A useful home study activity to help reinforce the learning of the six traits could be ten to fifteen minutes of free writing, where a student writes (preferably handwrites) on a topic of their choice or one prompted by an adult. Students can then self-assess their writing against the Traits of Writing criteria.
Michael Kelty
Literacy Coordinator