The day the “Master” came to ER

Grrrnnnhhhhh!

Be afraid, be very afraid. There is something very wrong with some of the seniors at MCHS.
It seems that the arrival of horror writer Darren Shan has somehow infected them.
Lucky for us we were right up the back of the theatre but in plain sight of the man himself who read to us from the first three of his Zom-B trilogy.

It is not for the fainty hearted – one first glance they are blood thirty, gorefests but as Darren explained he uses horror as a tool to tell another story and in this case one about rascism and standing up for yourself.

yeah you

After an hour of yucktastic details and mind-mushing questions and answers Darren signed every single book, poster and postcard. Not just a squiggle and a cheerio but a comment or a quote for EVERYONE. The poor man was due to leave the school at 2.50 but stayed on for another HOUR to make sure all the books he was given were signed and a sentence or two of inspiration were inscribed.

The afternoon was a great success and many, many thansk to our horrible hosts – MCHS especially the librarian Ms McEachern who must have had nightmares organising the event, Waterstones for making it happen, my great pupils who loved it all and finally to Darren Shan for his time and effort and inspiration (and especially writing such nice things in a book for a pupil off ill at the moment – a sweetie who can write horror!).

Scottish Book Trust Reviews

will you pick a winner

Have you been shadowing the SBT awards?
Or did you just pick up one by accident and want to let the world know it was good/bad/indifferent.

Well just follow the link here and you could win a prize.

Try to make your review interesting and enlightening, which is quite a tough task when reviews must only be 200 words long.
Good Luck.

Titles that can be reviewed are :
The 13th Horseman by Barry Hutchison
Code name Verity by Elizabeth Wein
The Prince who Walked with Lions by Elizabeth Laird

Competition Winners

Congratulations

Many thanks to all who entered the 12 word of Christmas competition.
We have over 300 entries the best ever for a library competition.

Many thanks to all who entered the 12 words of Christmas competition.
Over 300 entries were received.

So, who are the lucky, lucky winners?

*drum roll*

The winners:

Staff- Mrs Stephen – “The recent decline in the economy meant Santa couldn’t come to town”

Mrs Stephen wins a signed copy of Day by A.L Kennedy.

Pupil – Aodhan Gallagher – “The nurses transformed the old man’s last Christmas into his first Christmas.”

Aodhan wins a signed copy of Cosmic by Frank Cottrell Boyce and his entry will be forwarded to the national competition where he may just win a shiny new IPod touch.

Look out for more competition in the library you nevere know the next winner could be you!

Annual S1 Giamuncus quiz

Well done to …
Ms. Batchelor’s S1 class who narrowly pipped Mrs. Robertsons class to become this year’s champions.

They obviously know their Adele’s from their Opacs and their authors from their Avengers.

Thank you so much to all the staff and pupils who took part in this great event.

Which gives me the chance to use the word Giamuncus for no reason!

Entertain yourself

This is a brilliant little web site where you can create your own Top Trumps type cards.

This can be used for fun activities and can be created for families or football teams or can be used for school work as aide memoirs.
Create cards for different elements or regions or book characters.
This site is only as limited as your imagination.
E-mail me your best creations and they could be on this very web site for all to see.
Don’t be shy!

Calling bibliophiles and all round nice pupils


Do you have a morning break or a lunchtime to spare?

Would you like to get first dibs on all new books into the library?

Would you like to help out at events such as booksales and quizzes?

Then you might just be the type of person that we are looking for.

The library currently has 3 vacancies for library assistant. So, if you think you have what it takes then pop along to the library and let Mrs. Baird know.

All training will be provided.

Book Sale 2012

Many thanks to all who attended and helped out at this year’s booksale. We made a profit of over £150. This money will go towards supporting the library’s shadowing of the Stan Lee Excelsior Award and enable us to buy two sets of the nominated titles.

Win, win all round.

Rolling Circles

New for this year is the ambitious plan to have every single pupil in S1 reading a book in a mini book club.

The idea originated from the USA where literacy circles, as they are also called, have been on the go for over 20 years.

So far 100 pupils have selected their title and over 20 book groups created. Pupils will initially have to read only the first chapter to get a flavour of their read and create their own little character card which be displayed in the library like bunting or early Christmas decorations.

Once pupils are settled into their books and their groups they will then be given jobs – such as discussion director and literary luminary. Each job is like a jigsaw piece and when the whole group comes together they will have a fuller picture of what the novel is really about.

Our final plan is to create book trailers to promote books to pupils at the school and perhaps the wider public. Once the trailer is complete it will be hosted on YouTube and then we can create a QR code (one of those square barcodes you often see on adverts). We can take those codes and put them on the back of books in school and community library, thus allowing borrowers to sample our book group’s opinions of the book.

The whole idea is to get pupils reading and talking about books. Pupils are more likely to make literary connections when working in a group and hopefully will enjoy the process. Pupils will have to read at least one book to get the benefit of the scheme but can read many more if they like; learning more skills along the way.
With the support of the librarian and teachers and parents and of course the group I am hoping that every each and every pupil will enjoy this scheme and that it will give them the impetus to keep on reading into S2 and beyond.

If you would like to know any more about the scheme them please contact me at the library during school hours.
Mrs B

1 2 3 Booksale!

On the 30th of November the library will be hosting it’s annual booksale.

This year it is even bigger and better than last with hundreds of titles costing from as little as £1 and the most expensive costing only £3.
There will be fiction and non-fiction titles for sale including Wimpy Kids and Patrick Ness as well as The Hunger Games and Murderous Maths.

So, why not wander by the forum on the 30th and you might just pick yourself up a bargain or get an early Chrsitmas present for a friend.