Library News

Time for students to register for the Premiers’ Reading Challenge

St. Joseph’s College is once again participating in the 2021 Victorian Premiers’ Reading Challenge https://www.education.vic.gov.au/about/events/prc/Pages/default.aspx .  

All students Yr 7-10 have received an email with their individual password to participate in the Challenge.

Please encourage your student to open the email and register for the PRC by following the instructions.

All PRC books in the College Library Catalogue have a blue icon to show the PRC reading level.  The Library Catalogue can be accessed at SIMON/ Student Links/ Library Catalogue.

New e-book and e-audiobook collection available: Sora

The College Library has introduced a new e-book and e-audiobook collection, accessible through the downloadable Sora app or the College Library homepage on SIMON.  

The Sora digital collection is used by many Catholic Education Sandhurst schools, with all participating CES schools able to share access and cost of these quality digital resources.  

With SORA, students  can read e-books and listen to e-audiobooks on their device, highlight and download text, change font, select font designed to make text easier to read for users with dyslexia, and much more. 

To borrow resources from this digital collection students can go to SIMON/ Student Links/ Library Catalogue OR download the easy-to-use and engaging student reading app onto any device by going to http://soraapp.com  and selecting St. Joseph’s College Echuca from the drop-down menu.

Anzac Day resources on display

Anzac Day resources have been featured in a display in the College Library.  All resources are for loan by staff or students.   The collection on display includes biographies and autobiographies of service, including the Echuca Historical Society’s We Fought the Good Fight_Echuca Moama’s ANZACS, based on Letters from the Front as they appeared in the Riverine Herald. 

Some of the new resources in our Library - April 2021

The College Library regularly buys and updates resources for loan or for digital access.  Some of the new resources this month include:

LAMONT BOOKS SECONDARY FICTION BOOK OF THE MONTH

Lamont Books is a 100% Australian, family owned and operated business, and is Victoria's largest school library supplier as well as supplying books to schools throughout Australia.

The True Colour of a Little White Lie  by Cabriel Begmoser

Nelson is the main character in this story of his winter on the Australian ski slopes.  During the week he goes to school in town and on the weekends he skis, meets new people and gets himself into all sorts of problems by pretending to be someone he’s not!

This is a story of growing up and finding out who you are, and more importantly, who you don’t want to be.

FOR AVID SECONDARY READERS:

                                                                                             Off the Map by Scot Gardner

It is a real skill to create compelling stories in as few as five pages, like Thingless - that makes you wonder if we really need all of our ‘things’.  Scot’s stories are typically punchy and will especially resonate with many teenage boys, but also with all teenagers.With many themes covered, including identity, family, peer pressure, masculinity, and life and death, it is easy to just read one story, but you will want to read them all.

 Sunburnt Veils  by Sara Haghdoosti

Sunburnt Veils is a wonderful story of diversity and acceptance. Our hero is the book-loving, super-intelligent Tara, who chooses to wear hijab and is a Sydney University, first-year, med student.  With a touch of humour,  this book effortlessly tackles themes of discrimination, Islamophobia, and explores Tara’s determination to try to make the world a truly more accepting and better place.

FOR EMERGING SECONDARY READERS:

Heroes of the Secret Underground

A timely and powerful time-slip story inspired by the author's family in Budapest during the Holocaust.  Louie lives with her brothers, Bert and Teddy, in a hotel run by their grandparents. It is one of Sydney's grand old buildings, rich in history ... and in secrets.  When a rose-gold locket, once thought lost, is uncovered, it sends Louie and her brothers spinning back in time. Back to a world at war: Budapest in the winter of 1944, where their grandparents are hiding secrets of their own ...

NON-FICTION:

On Red Earth Walking by Anne Scrimgeour

In 1946 Aboriginal people walked off pastoral stations in Western Australia’s Pilbara region, withdrawing their labour from the economically-important wool industry to demand improvements in wages and conditions. Their strike lasted three years. 

On Red Earth Walking is the first comprehensive account of this significant, unique, and understudied episode of Australian history.

 Deep Time Dreaming by Billy Griffiths

Soon after Billy Griffiths joins his first archaeological dig as camp manager and cook, he is hooked. Equipped with a historian’s inquiring mind, he embarks on a journey through time, seeking to understand the extraordinary deep history of the Australian continent.  Deep Time Dreaming is the passionate product of that journey.  This multi-award winning book explores what it means to live in a place of great antiquity, with its complex questions of ownership and belonging.