Stories from the Library

Last week four of our Year 5 Inklings students won a state award in the National History Competition. Congratulations Adnan, Davi, Kyle and Hollie. This award was well deserved, with these students spending many break times working on their project with me in the temporary library. The group researched many of the big debates on the natural and built environment in Tasmania’s history: Lake Pedder, The Franklin Dam, forestry and mining in the Tarkine, commercial salmon farming and the Macquarie Point Stadium. 

They were, “Learning to think rigorously, so as to act rightly and to serve humanity better.” Saint John Paul II

This group are also big library users and very keen readers, as are many of our students. Their achievement demonstrates the importance of reading. As children’s author, Nova Weetman, writes in The Guardian on September 12, 2023, “The value of reading isn’t easy to measure, even if we intrinsically understand its importance. Reading helps us to learn vocabulary and grammar and understand the nature of a story. It helps us to learn empathy as we delve into the worlds of others and travel to new lands.”

Our builders are busy working on our new library, the heart of our school, which will be completed early next year. The library will be staffed by a teacher librarian with qualifications in education and librarianship, supported by a qualified library technician. With our new hall, lunch program and new library, we are blessed to have a school that provides and supports such great facilities for our students.

Nova Weetman eloquently explains the importance of school libraries when she writes, “I’ve visited beautiful school libraries, magical places with trained librarians…These libraries are well used. They are places of worship because the students value them. Visit at lunchtime and they are heaving...The library has long been an ally to students needing an escape. A place surrounded not just by books but by adults who understand, who read…These librarians know their collections, can pass the right book into the right hands and discuss stories with students for hours. But more than that, these librarians demonstrate to students the importance of reading.”

Mrs Kathryn Jaeger

Teacher Librarian/Inklings Extension Teacher

Mrs Kathryn Jaeger

Teacher Librarian and English/HASS Extension

________________________________________________________________

JPII ONLINE LIBRARY CATALOGUE

Our library catalogue Oliver - is available online. 

Everything available in our library can be viewed using the following link – 

https://jpclarendonvale.softlinkhosting.com.au/oliver/home/browse/list