LIBRARY NEWS

Welcome to week 5, it's hard to believe it's nearly halfway through the term already. This week we’re putting the finishing touches to some projects students have been working on over the last few weeks and I’m looking forward to sharing these with you soon. 

Stage 3 have been busy making their own graphic novel and have enjoyed using Storyboard That to digitally create a page. 

Stage 2 are finishing their research project on an Australian author and learning how to open a template in Google Classroom, import images and format their slides. It’s been a steep learning curve but they’re looking good.

In the younger years we’re getting close to the end of their non-fiction unit. I’ve been so impressed with the way Kinder has started to use the terms fiction and non-fiction when discussing books and this week they’re going to be sorting books into their classification using the covers as clues. I’m looking forward to another Philip Bunting book with Stage 1, ‘The Wonderful Wisdom of Ants’ and they’ll be using their Ipad to access World Book Online and learn more about ants.  It’s been perfect timing experiencing Philip’s books as he’s the author of this week’s book National Simultaneous Storytime story.

Over the last week, I’ve also enjoyed reading Kate & Jol Temple’s new story, ‘Move That Mountain’. Their previous book, ‘No Room On Our Rock’ is written the same way where you can read the story moving forward and in reverse to get two sides to the story. It’s very clever and I’m always amazed how the beautiful illustrations by Terri-Rose Baynton even make sense going both ways. I thoroughly recommend you read both these books if you get a chance.

National Simultaneous Storytime Day

This Wednesday, our school will be joining with schools across Australia at 11am to listen simultaneously to ‘Give Me Some Space’ by Philip Bunting being read by astronaut Dr Shannon Walker live from the International Space Station. Families can also join in to watch by registering with ALIA here. Some fun colouring and activities are available for you to use at home also. You can also visit the Scholastic Australia Facebook page on Wednesday to see author, Philip Bunting, host the launch of the event from the Australian Space Discovery Centre in Adelaide too.

Quick reminders:

• Scholastic Book Club - this term’s catalogue will be coming in the next couple of weeks
• Library Bags - please remember to send one in with your child when they borrow, we’ve had a few books returned lately with water damage from school bags. Thank you for assistance with this.
• Overdue Books - if your child has lost their library book, please just send a note in with your child so we can take it off their record. Usually, these books are found at another time or in some random place, so please don’t worry too much, we understand that this happens.
• Premier’s Reading Challenge - don’t forget to keep reading and logging your books onto the PRC website. Once you have read the required number of books to complete your challenge, print off the Personal Reading Log and have your child bring it into the library for me to validate. Thanks for your continued support of this great program.
• Friday, 11 June 2021 - Kids’ Lit Quiz in Armidale

CBCA Book of the Year - Early Childhood

This week I thought we would start to look at the shortlisted books in the Early Childhood category of the 2021 Children’s Book Council of Australia, Book of the Year Awards. We have received these books in our library already and I’m looking forward to reading them with our students next term, they’re great stories. Entries in this category may be fiction, drama or poetry and should be appropriate in style and content for children who are at pre-reading or early stages of reading, aged 0-6 years. For more information about these books, you can visit the CBCA site here.

Shortlisted books are:

• We Love You Magoo
• There’s No Such Thing
• No, Never
• Anemone is Not the Enemy
• Who’s Your Real Mum?
• Busy Beaks

Mrs Toni Fraser