Library 16-17
Welcome Back Hawk Readers!
Everyone
- Lots of scrolling down. Sorry! Everyone please read this one, the three photos below, and their relevant section (by header).
- Schedule isn't being formed quite yet as I don't know when I'll be available and not pulled for other things or how long it will take for the students to be loaded and properly in the circ system. If you have a request for a time go ahead and email me a couple different options. PreK-K weekly story and checkout. 1st grade checkout every week, every other story and activity. Third through fifth 15 minute checkout every other week and lessons as we make time for hopefully fabulousness together.
- We don't have to wait for the circ system to start lessons! Got an idea? You know how to find me!
- As soon as I can the library will open for kids on passes at 8:30 (after announcements AND morning meeting ... you need the time and we need the time!) We need kids to come in the afternoon in time to be FINISHED by 2:50. I start getting little ones for daycare!
- We still need books for classes coming together as soon after morning announcements as possible, no later than 9AM and preferably before!
- Request ... I'd like to make our classroom reading more of a public celebration. If you read something your class really enjoys, be it a book, magazine article, or online article please use this quick survey link (found on the main library page as well). I'll print a book cover or screen shot and place it on the shelves in the hallway. Doesn't need to be every book you ever read by a long shot but the closer we could get to 10 a nince weeks (hence the online or magazine articles ... cause I know chapter book read alouds take a lot longer than picture books!) the more awesome it will be. If we fill up the shelves super fast I'll change them out like every 9 weeks.
- Fall bookfair will be the third week in October. Literary pumpkin patch the 4th (ie Halloween is on a Monday and it will be the week BEFORE! Hopefully the real pumpkins will go home in time to decorate).
- I haven't figured out the best way to hand out Spirit Sticks this year. I do not want to add work to you (or parents) in terms of a separate reading log. Have you seen the FB live video from just night before last by Teri Lesesne, Kylene Beers, and Donalyn Miller? Or any of the many articles and discussions by literacy leaders all summer? Separate formal reading logs don't really demonstrate reading. They prove parents signed the paper. I have some ideas but would love to collaborate with what works for you in your classroom! We want the kids setting and reaching reading goals. It's just figuring out how to measure that!
New Library Catalog
Remember how last year we had two? Now it's only the new one! Right now there is no "email the librarian a list" function but that should be returning soon. I'll let you know! Lots of other functionality. You can keep lists of books on topics of interest sort of like Discovery Ed, for one.
Remember TeachingBooks? It's back! State is paying this time.
AWESOME for helping to find lessons related to authors or find literature related to a topic. See me for quick help on creating a teacher login to access extra information and search capability!
New Ebooks
These are NOT in the catalog like the Overdrive and other non-fic ebooks the district has purchased, so you'll have to go to these links to search. But there are some great ones and the state won't continue to fund what we don't use!
K-2
- Checkout will be for one week.
- We'll still start with one book for a couple weeks and then move up to two after good habits are in place.
- NO MORE TREASURE BOX! :/ We need to save the money for new books and new tables. It didn't really help anyway ... the kids that always got to go would have brought their books back on time anyway, nor did it motivate the kids that had trouble remembering their books. It will be the same shelf markers so hopefully everyone can still get used to that.
3-5
- Class checkouts are still every two weeks.
- Checkouts are for 2 weeks and the limit will be 3 items, no matter the grade. 3 is the limit for the self-checkout station and I can't change that, it's a district thing. Kiddos had trouble keeping that straight ALL last year so we're just removing that frustration. Also 3 items will take less time to checkout so you don't need to worry so much about sending them on passes! Also neither of us have to worry about so many books ... hiding in desks and at home and preventing new checkouts. Of course there will be exceptions for special projects.
- At least one item should always be kid's choice. If you prefer otherwise they don't need to be reading magazines or graphic novels or using drawing books during school time ... but at home they need to have those choices!
- If students have overdue books one option is always Overdrive (both in the library during checkout and in the classroom). Can't ever have overdue books on Overdrive!
- NO MORE TREASURE BOX. Still the same cards with the holes we used to punch but we're saving the money to put toward new books and new tables. It never really helped, anyway. The kids that got to go to the treasure box would have been returning their books anyway.
- I'll let you know in September when MakerMornings will start. One change this year is that it will be 3-4 days a week (usually 4!). I wanted to add some more purposeful activities but last year was always running behind in prep since we start right at 7:15. The prep day will usually be Mondays. Also I would like to be able to have some sort of open tech or book request "office hours" where teachers can come in and get my full attention and not me trying to help them and keep track of the kids at the same time!
- I need your help in supporting the TX Bluebonnet Award books. They're the first thing you see when you walk in and will be highlighted on the hallway monitor display. Kids don't need to read (and it's not even recommended!) all 20. Just FIVE. FIVE! So far my favorites are Echo and Fog Diver but yours could be different. We had a binder with a place for kids to check off what they'd read but had poor participation last year. If I'm stuck over at the circ desk I can't encourage that out at the shelves like I used to. Not always stuck there but more than I used to be, no? Even if only to troubleshoot the self-checkout. Fourth grade, the battle books are also on that very front display. We don't have them all yet but I'm working on it!
Strong 4th and 5th
Pretty excited about this one. Anything with that black bar down the side integrates so beautifully with Google so that also applies to Infobits and Nat Geo. This one just covers some topics to a depth we didn't have before.
Contact the Librarian
Email: aolive@neisd.net
Website: http://neisd.libguides.com/welcome_harmony_hills_library
Phone: 2104073824
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Harmony-Hills-ES-Library/228169720533969
Twitter: @senoritao