Tag Archives: Reading Schools

March 2022 Roundup

World Book Day Week: This year, World Book Day was celebrated on Thursday, March 3rd and the School Library delivered a plethora of fun, bookish activities throughout the week. We published the results from our #ReadingSchools Library Survey and Book Personality Quiz that took place over January/February. The full report was uploaded to the Library channel on Teams, but an abridged version can be found here.

Our World Book Day programme included the following activities, where participants were entered into a prize draw for a £20 National Book Token:

Bookshelf Challenge: Pupils were invited to guess the teacher based on a clue and a picture a staff member’s bookshelf. The activity was uploaded to the Library Channels on each year group’s Teams and all participants were entered into the WBD prize draw
Scavenger Hunt: Pupils had to guess the teacher and find which book they were reading which was displayed on a #ReadingSchools poster. Those who submitted completed forms were entered into the WBD prize draw.
World Book Day Quiz: A book-themed quiz was delivered during both lunch periods in the School Library. All participants were entered into the WBD prize draw and those with the highest points received three entries into the draw.

In addition to the World Book Day activities, the school library also launched reading challenges and competitions. These included:

Bookopoly: Pupils are given a Bookopoly board. They can choose to read two fiction books per genre, one nonfiction book per subject, and/or three ‘chances’ where they can either select a ‘reading dare’ or spin the Wheel of Genre. The completion of each genre/subject/chance grants them an entry into the monthly school library prize draw. Pupils can also earn a certificate for completing the entire board.
Ask Me What I’m Reading: The winning designs from our Ask Me What I’m Reading design competition were circulated alongside a sheet where pupils must ask five people what they’re reading. This is to encourage pupils and staff to have a conversation about books and promoting literature via word of mouth. Submitted forms grants one entry into the monthly school library prize draw.
Reader of the Week: We’ve also launched a Reader of the Week initiative where pupils can complete either a #ReadingSchools shelf shouter to be displayed on the bookshelves (think Waterstones) or a book review template to be displayed on either the Reader Recommendations bulletin board, the monthly newsletter or Swatch magazine. Each submissions earns an entry into the school library monthly prize draw and pupils who submit the most reviews per week earn a Reader of the Week certificate and ribbon.

Short Story competition: The Short Story competition is the brainchild of two pupils (S2 + S6) who are members of our Pupil Library Committee, both of whom are part of the judging panel. We received fourteen-short stories across all yer groups. The pupil judges divided the stories into 2 groups, BGE and S4-Senior. Within those groups, they judged each story based on a set of criteria based on various short story competitions we researched around the Web. The winners for each category are as follows:
BGE Stories:Top score: Mother

Top Mechanics: The beginning of the rest of my life

Top Expression: Untiled

Characterisation: Queen of all creatures

Plot: A true love between sisters

Theme: Your melody flowing me away

Attention Grabbing Opening: A wonderful place called Cat

Passion: Corruption

Originality: Amanda sparks a woeful saga of pain

Short Story S4-Senior winners:

Top score: Faithful Truth

Top Mechanics: Timeless Book Chronicles

Top Expression: Reminiscent Hours
Fantasy Football competition: This is a fun literacy-based activity aimed at football fans and reluctant/struggling readers. Pupils are given a sheet to complete their own fantasy football team (based on real players, past or present) and instructed to give the reasons why they’ve been selected. This activity has also been promoted in Physical Education department. Each submission earns an entry into the prize draw for a copy of Ultimate Football Heroes: Sancho, signed by the author Matt Oldfield.

Pupil Library Committee: Our PLC members were very busy this month with various activities:

Pop-Up Library: Members of our 50+ strong Pupil Library Committee volunteered to host a pop-up library stall in the Fuel Zone during lunches throughout World Book Day week. Members promoted the variety of World Book Day activities and reading challenges as well as selected books to display and promote for borrowing. This initiative was so successful that we’re planning on hosting other Pop-Up Libraries in the future.
March Display: This month’s pupil curated display included highlights for International Women’s Day (March 8th), The International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (March 21st), World Poetry Day (March 21st) and Transgender Visibility Day (March31st).

Spring Break Quiz: Two of our S3 PLC members researched and help compile a list of questions for our Spring Break Quiz, which included questions about the many faith-based and cultural festivals that take place during Spring as well as some book-based questions on book awards, upcoming book-to-film series, literary dates and author birthdays.

International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination: In preparation for the International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (aka Anti-Racism Day), over 30 pupils from S1-6 were invited to select fiction and nonfiction books with anti-racism themes. Their suggestions will help inform the expansion of our ‘Equality and Empowerment’ section for next year as well as for the eBooks available on the Glasgow Libraries’ Libby app, thus ensuring a pupil voice is represented in the selection. See the full list here

World Poetry Day Quiz: Pupils and staff were invited to participate in a quiz of Teams, inspired by the Librarian @GrammarLRC. Can you guess whether the passage is a lyric or a title?

Library Publications: Swatch Spring 22

March Booklists

March 22 Booklists – Book Trust

Best New Children’s Books – Toppsta

Bookbug’s Books of the Month – Scottish Book Trust

Books of the Month – LoveReading4Kids

March Roundup – Love Reading

Book of the Month – Scholastic

Books of the Month – Waterstones

Children’s Book Roundup – Guardian

Upcoming Events (April)

BigDog Book Festival (Wigtown, Scotland, 1st – 3rd)

Cúirt International Festival of Literature (Galway, Ireland, 4th – 10th)

Southside Fringe (Glasgow, Scotland)

Wee Write Festival (Glasgow, Scotland)

Cambridge Literary Festival (Cambridge, England, 20th – 24th)

Soutar Festival of Words (Perth, Scotland, 22nd – 24th)

World Book Night (UK & International, 23rd)

McLellan Arts Festival Poetry Fringe (Arran, Scotland, 28th)

Colonsay Book Festival (Colonsay, Scotland 30th)

Bocas Lit Fest (Caribbean, 30th – 2nd May)

Past Events (March)

International Women’s Day (8th ) & Women’s History Month

British Science Week (11-20 )

Neurodiversity Celebration Week (21st – 27th )

Jaipur Lit Fest

Literary Awards & Prizes

Winners

Audie Awards

Blue Peter Book Awards

OCM Bocas Prize for Caribbean Literature

Rathebones Folio Prize

Royal Society Children’s Book Prize

Shortlists

YOTO Kate Greenaway Medal

Waterstone’s Children’s Book Prize

Longlists

International Booker Prize

Jhalak Prize

Women’s Prize

In the news:

A Field Guide to Strange Medieval Monsters – Open Culture

Beyond the fog of war: Books to help us understand the invasion of Ukraine – Guardian

Free Colouring Books from the Public Domain Review – Open Culture

Outrage as LGBT author banned at state school – Politics.co.uk

The Reading Agency partners with the British Science Museum on this year’s Summer Reading Challenge Theme – The Reading Agency

2021 Recap

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The blog is back! Watch this space for monthly updates from Shawlands Academy School Library.

2021 Recap – What have we been up to?

eBooks & eAudiobooks: The library continued to roll out the Libby app to all S1 pupils. The eBooks, audiobooks, and eMagazines supplement the physical stock in the library, offering pupils a broader range of formats and books, with accessibility features to make the reading experience more inclusive.

Reading Schools accreditation: This year, the school library has signed-up Shawlands Academy to the Scottish Book Trust’s Reading Schools accreditation programme. The Reading Schools programme is committed to building a reading culture across the school community. With some Covid restrictions still in place, we are aiming for the core level certificate with the possibility of applying for silver or gold in the 2022-2023 school year. Our Reading Schools leadership committee have met in December to plan for the 2022 term and have discuss loads of exciting activities and initiatives to roll throughout the term. We’re currently accepting submissions for our ‘Ask Me What I’m Reading’ badges and official school bookmark to tie in with the programme. Pupils will vote on the designs throughout February and the winning designs will be created into badges and bookmarks to be distributed during World Book Day in March.

Throughout January and February, learners and staff will be offered the opportunity to complete a book personality quiz and library survey. The survey will help inform best practice and identify areas of improvement in the library and reading culture across the school. The book personality quiz is a fun way to engage people with reading out with their comfort zone by suggesting genres, authors, and books that they might like to try. Both the quiz and the survey will be delivered by the school librarian in classes and on Teams. Our PT of Family and Inclusion will also be including it in their newsletter.

Pupil Library Committee: This year, the school library has created the Pupil Library Committee to help provide young people’s voice in the stock and library service. So far, we have 50+ volunteers from all year groups Several committee members are tying it into to their Saltire and Duke of Edinburgh Awards. Duties include shelving and organising stock, selecting books to be featured in the library’s monthly newsletters, create and deliver quizzes/activities, and curate monthly displays for Interfaith Week, Black History Month, and World Space Week. Some members of the PLC have also been heavily involved in stock selection, focusing on graphic novels, thrillers, and enhancing our Equality & Empowerment collections. Some PLC members are also included on the Reading Schools committee and their ideas have been crucial towards embedding a pupil-led reading culture throughout the school. We’ll be posting more about this in future blog posts.

Book Week Scotland: The library hosted pupil-led activities throughout Book Week Scotland in November 2021. Committee members created and delivered their own Manga Quiz during lunches throughout the week. Committee members also designed and compiled Book Week Scotland Book Boxes full of pupil recommendations that were delivered to teacher bases. Staff were delighted to receive their free copy of the official Book Week Scotland book, Celebrate, gifted by PLC members.

EAL book group: We’ve continued our EAL book group this year. The project is funded by the Scottish Library and Information Council on behalf of the Scottish Government through their Scottish Library Improvement Fund, which support innovative projects in the school library sector. The EAL project is aimed at pupils who are developing their English literacy skills whilst also placing an emphasis at valuing home/original languages and multilingualism. In addition to reading books and completing literacy-based activities, pupils are invited to create multilingual signage for the library and contribute book reviews to school library newsletter and magazine. In November, our group met the fabulous graphic novel duo, Metaphrog, who discussed their books, illustrations and creative journey.

The project also supported Shawlands Academy’s first ‘Community Languages’ collection, a section devoted to books and resources in languages other than English. Many thanks to GCC EAL and Dyslexia Unit as well as Multilingual Library Scotland for their recommendations. We’re excited for the upcoming Languages Week Scotland and International Mother Language Day (Feb 21st), where our group will be looking at an array of international book awards and festivals for young people. On a city-wide level, our group is collaborating with other EAL book groups to create a pupil-led Glasgow Guide by and for pupils. Work on the guide is still ongoing and we’ve commissioned Metaphrog to design the cover and background.

Seed Library: The School Library is collaborating with MCR Pathways and Fare Scotland to develop a seed library for the school and for the school garden with resources and support from the Royal Horticultural Society. The MCR Pathways and Fare Scotland coordinators work with a group of young people to build practical gardening skills as well as learn about sustainability and the environment. The seed library, though still in development, will be pupil created and led, focusing on seeds derived from the school garden as well as providing information about how to grow food at home.

Professional Development Library: This year saw the implementation of the Professional Development Library, curated by Mrs Torbett and housed in the school library. School staff can now access a range of professional reading to help develop and enhance existing skills. Mrs Torbett also runs a staff professional reading group and takes book requests from staff. In addition to the in-house collection, The Glasgow Libraries’ eResource, ProQuest, offers professional and trade journals and articles which can provide staff with recent research and analysis in their discipline.

Workshops: Throughout the Autumn period, the school library visited several classrooms to deliver bespoke workshops to BGE, Higher, and Advanced Higher classes. The workshops introduced pupils to a number for quality, online resources to supplement their studies. These included the British Library, the National Library of Scotland, National Museums Scotland, the Natural History Museum, ProQuest and Gale Literature Resource Center. Staff from the Mitchell Library’s Business & IP Center were also invited to deliver a session on copyright and intellectual property to the school’s S2 Enterprise class in November.

Primary visit: We were delighted to arrange a special class visit with a small P6 class from Shawlands Primary as part of their transition programme. Children were introduced to the school library and stock through a book tasting session.

Library publications: This year, the school library has continued its monthly newsletter, packed with book lists, reviews and the latest news in the YA literary world. An interactive format is posted in each year group Team’s Library Channel. The Glasgow School Library service has also continued its quarterly digital magazine, Swatch. In it, you can find author interviews, guest features, book lists, crafts, quizzes and more. The upcoming issue will be released in March. Links to past issues are below.

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