Learning Resource Service

Last year we were contacted by Mrs Firth from Nethermains Primary School in Denny to give advice on book-banding their reading schemes. A Teams meeting and one visit to the school later and the school had signed-up for the Scottish Book Trust’s Reading Schools programme and wanted to create a… Read more

Staff and pupils in Falkirk Council have had automatic access to 1000s of eBooks and eAudiobooks through their Glow account since 2018. We provide this service for every school for free and as pupils/staff already have a Glow log-in there are no barriers to joining the library, just download the… Read more

The Exploding Life of Scarlett Fife by Maz Evans is a fabulously funny story about a girl who has BIG FEELINGS which get her into trouble. Find out what our #FalkirkReadingTeachers think – Warning! These reviews contain spoilers. Ages 7-9           Review 1 – 4/5 stars… Read more

Welcome to the Zetland Park Fountain Tales: Creative Writing Resource Inside the Teacher’s Guide below and the supporting series of 12 creative writing tip videos you will find all the information that you need to deliver engaging literacy lessons that explore the mystery of the missing statue from the top… Read more

    The UK’s longest running and best-loved book awards for children and young people, the Yoto Carnegie Greenaway Awards, have announced the longlists for 2022. 33 books have been selected in total – 18 for the Yoto Carnegie Medal and 15 for the Yoto Kate Greenaway Medal – with… Read more

The new furniture has arrived and we created a story corner and senior comfy reading area for pupils to relax and enjoy their new books. Pupil Voice is central to Sacred Heart’s ethos and we consulted with pupils on how they would like their library to look. They asked for… Read more

Apply now for Scottish Book Trust’s Live Literature programme, a wonderful opportunity to invite an author to your school for £75 instead of £175. Scottish Book Trust will pay the rest of the fees and travel costs. The current application window covers Live Literature events taking place before 31 March… Read more

Welcome to the Falkirk Canals Classroom, an activity pack for primary school students that celebrates the fascinating history of the Union and Forth & Clyde canals in the Falkirk area. Below, you will find everything you need to deliver lessons on the canals, with hands-on activities to do on the… Read more

Previous winners and shortlists: RED 15 (2020-2021 award): Eoin Colfer and Andrew Donkin Illegal Nominated: Summer Bird Blue, Akemi Dawn Bowman A Pocketful of Stars, Aisha Bushby My Name’s Not Friday, Jon Walter RED 14 (2019-2020 award): Lauren James The Quiet at the End of the World Nominated: Orphan Monster… Read more

See the latest reviews here #FalkirkReadingTeachers′ Book Group (1) Read more

One of our main roles in supporting our primary schools is to help them develop and refurbish their school libraries. We tailor our support according to the needs of each school and the remit they provide. It can range from advice, purchasing new books, reorganisation, library cataloguing systems and full… Read more

Our Early Years Book Group has been looking at new picture books that can be used for STEM. Picture books are fantastic for stimulating learning and many are wonderful for a STEM Through Stories focus. The Falkirk STEM Officers support us by providing story planners for each book to give… Read more

Fantastic resources to support using the beautiful book ‘The Lost Words’ by Robert MacFarlane and Jackie Morris From The John Muir Trust: Literacy Nature 2020 The Lost Words Read more

Our teacher book group is continuing to read, discuss and review a range of new books for children and we want to share this as widely as possible. Here we review ‘When the sky falls’ by Phil Earle and ‘The small things’ by Lisa Thompson #FalkirkReadingTeachers′ Book Group Read more

Welcome to the Flood Risk in Falkirk STEM Activity Box Inside the Teacher’s Guide below you will find all the information you need to deliver a jam-packed STEM lesson with a hands-on activity, local heritage links and future career inspiration for your pupils! The learning materials included are best suited… Read more

Welcome to the Blue Carbon in Falkirk STEM Activity Box Inside the Teacher’s Guide below you will find all the information you need to deliver a jam-packed STEM lesson with a hands-on activity, local heritage links and future career inspiration for your pupils! The learning materials included are best suited… Read more

You Can Be Campaign – Book Audit | Zero Tolerance The You Can Be Book Audit is a chance for ELCs and nurseries to win £100 worth of books by taking part in an audit of their book collections. The idea is to bring greater gender balance and challenge old-fashioned… Read more

Inclusive Stories Our last round of books focused on LGBT+ families and inclusive stories. All children deserve to see their own lives represented in the stories we share and books are a fantastic way to build empathy and understanding of others. The discussion was very positive and one of the… Read more

The Learning Resource Service runs two book groups for teachers and early years practitioners in the Falkirk council area. They aim to:   increase teacher knowledge of quality children’s books support teachers in creating a reading culture in their classroom provide opportunities to talk about children’s books identify books that… Read more

The RED Book Award celebrates its 15th anniversary and to mark this achievement, the wonderful shortlist focuses on a BAME theme: Summer Bird Blue by Akemi Dawn Bowman A Pocketful of Stars by Aisha Bushby  Illegal by Eoin Colfer and Andrew Donkin My Name’s Not Friday by Jon Walters The… Read more

Read and listen for free Sally Gardner’s Mr Tiger, Betsy and the Blue Moon, illustrated by Nick Maland. An enchanting story by a much loved author about Betsy K Glory, the daughter of a mermaid and an ice-cream maker, who meets the mysterious Mr Tiger and they have a giant challenge:… Read more

The theme of this year’s Children’s Mental Health Week is Express Yourself. Expressing yourself is about finding ways to share feelings, thoughts, or ideas, through creativity, through art, music, writing and poetry, dance and drama, photography and film. Free resources for children and young people are available to explore what… Read more

From Grandad’s Island by Benji Davies Click here for video resources for 11 author/illustrators, freely available on the CLPE YouTube channel and enjoy listening to 11 picture books read aloud by the authors/illustrators. An amazing resource perfect for lockdown for parents and children to listen to. Enjoy! Benji Davies shows how to… Read more

The Royal Society of Edinburgh (RSE) have announced a free School Talks programme where a number of their Fellows will be delivering free online talks to schools throughout Scotland. All talks are presented by inspirational experts, keen to enthuse and excite young people in P6 – S6 covering Sciences; Technologies;… Read more

  Great news! Mantra Lingua is a UK based publisher of award winning multilingual education resources and is offering free access to ebooks for home reading. Their ebooks come in 37 languages and you can enjoy the books free until 31st August 2020. Click here to sign up and start… Read more

Enjoy an interview with the best selling author Dan Freedman, the writer of the FANTASTIC Jamie Johnson football novels,  take a Premier League  challenge and VERY IMPORTANTLY read Dan Freedman’s e-book The Kick Off here absolutely free! Enjoy! Read more

The RED Book Award, now in its 14th year, was in danger of not going ahead because of the coronavirus, however it was decided to organise the ceremony on-line. Over 70 teachers and pupils gathered on Microsoft Teams on 27/5/2020 to join the 4 wonderful shortlisted authors: Lauren James who… Read more

 Reading stories helps us to see things through other people’s eyes and helps us to develop empathy. On the week of 18 May – empathy lab  will be launching toolkits for schools which can be used on Empathy Day, 9 June, just email primary@empathylab.uk or secondary@empathylab.uk and write Toolkit in the subject to… Read more

At this time you may wish to read stories online as one of the many ways to digitally engage children and young people. Many publishers understand this, and have temporarily lifted or adjusted their copyright guidelines and permissions, please visit this website to find out which publishers have adjusted their policies. You will… Read more

Due to the school closures, the deadline for sending submissions to the First Minister’s Reading Challenge has been extended to the 14th May 2020. Your evidence of nurturing a love of reading can be in the form of a piece of writing, or a film, photo diary, presentation or mind… Read more

Book Trust have developed this digital hub. It is packed full of free books, videos, games, recipes, competitions, quizzes and much more. Plus, watch live readings and draw-a-longs with celebrated children’s authors and illustrators.. Why not try RadioBlogging – daily shows with interactive activities to keep everyone busy and engaged, brought to… Read more

  Falkirk Council’s Learning Resource Service has added e-books and unabridged e-audio books to the resources available to borrow for pupils and school staff. This is a brilliant way to develop and maintain a love of reading especially in the current situation where schools and public libraries are closed. We have invested in… Read more

  A free information book was released this week to help explain the coronavirus to children, illustrated by the Gruffalo illustrator Axel Scheffler. You can access it here. Read more

  The RED Book Award is Falkirk Council’s Book Award in which each secondary school in the authority participate. RED stands for Read, Enjoy, Debate and is all about reading for enjoyment and stimulating lively debate about books. https://twitter.com/readenjoydebate?lang=en At the time of writing this post, the award is now… Read more

The RED Book Award is run by the Learning Resource Service promoting reading for enjoyment for S2 and S3 pupils in Falkirk Council. The shortlist for this year’s RED Book Award was: Beneath by Gill Arbuthnot Salvage by Keren David Mind Blind by Lari Don Inflicted by Ria Frances All great books… Read more

The Learning Resource Service wishes you a Happy National Poetry Day! From nursery rhymes to epic poems, we have a broad range of poetry to support literacy in your school. Go to Falkirk Council’s Literacy Strategy to find out more about National Poetry Day. Read more

Bothkennar Primary School called in the help of Learning Resource Service to re-organise their library! The children wrote in to tell us what they thought…..   Read more

Falkirk Council’s Learning Resource Service prides itself in excellent service delivery to all educational establishments in the Falkirk Council area. A film has been produced to promote the service which can be viewed here Read more