Tag Archives: school library

All change at Eastbank – library refurbishment

Come and see our transformation in the Eastbank Academy Library !

Through the summer, Mrs Marshall and her many helpers (thank you librarians and janitorial staff !) worked to transform the library space at Eastbank Academy.   The whole project involved recycling unwanted bookcases from other libraries with little or no money spent.  Some bookcases work so well in a different space and our library has a new lease of life.  At the start of the project, when you decide to change a library space, you have to move lots – and lots, and lots – of books !

   

And when the books are off the shelves, then the shelves are the next thing to dismantle.  What a job that was!  It involved lots of helpers to take down the bookshelves which had been at Eastbank for several years.  Being a green school, we saved some of these shelves for other projects.  Here’s how the shelves looked all piled up after taking the bookcases apart.

One by one we built the new bookcases and got the new spinner book cases into place.   The library definitely was looking quite different now.   The light colours of the bookcases definitely looked brighter and gave us more room to relax while choosing books.

 

In addition, the library was provided with 2 brand new small bookcases which will become home to special collections in the library, such as our Shelf Help selection of books.

 

Finally, this week, the last bookcase arrived to complete our transformation !  It’s looking great and certainly makes the non-fiction more attractive and easier to see.

Overall, the pupils’ feedback has all been very positive, and they enjoy coming into the new space to choose their books. The library now is far more attractive, but also far easier to use.  With a new layout instead of just rows of books and new signage, book borrowing is a better experience.  The library itself is a lovely space to be in.  We are all looking forward to the rest of the school year in our the new library space.

 

 

 

Lochend new non fiction

We’ve had some amazing new non fiction arrive last week at Lochend.  Why don’t you prepare for Halloween at the end of October by reading some gruesome and scary new books?

Do No Harm and Cursebreaker 

Nothing is scarier than real life, and in Do No Harm there’s lots of real life medical stories from the past to the present day.  This book shows how we’ve come from cutting off limbs with saws right up to date – making progress in the fight against cancer and other diseases.  A great read, with short sections and fantastic graphics

 

Cursebreaker   

Want to be scared?  This book, with it’s creepy adventures, gives you the choice to play a game where you can escape from prison – then fight your way to freedom via a fantasy world.  Great fun.

New Non Fiction

There’s lots to love in our new non fiction selection. Whether you want to find the confidence to speak up and be heard, or select a new film to watch there’s something for everyone.  Even a new Vegan cook book to get you cooking new recipies !

 

 

 

Book of the Month for October – Artificial Intelligence by Tom Jackson

This tiny book is a colourful explosion of  great information, with 4 chapters taking us from the early days of AI decades ago right up to today.   It’s a great read, giving clear information and you can dip into topics without having to read the full book.

Storytelling for Mental Health project/Book Week Scotland 2022

November was a very busy month in the library. Not only did we have Book Week Scotland, but we also had a trip to the Mitchell library and our Storytelling Group have also been busy!

 

Book Week Scotland/Metaphrog trip

Our theme for Book Week Scotland was ‘Scotland’s Stories’ so we decided the best thing to celebrate Scottish stories was to set up a literary map of Scotland! From the Borders to Shetland,  the Western Isles to Edinburgh, we displayed a wide range of stories set in Scotland.

 

 

 

 

We also took the opportunity to take some of our S1s to the Mitchell for a talk and exhibition by Glasgow-based comic artists Metaphrog. Everyone had a great morning and hopefully some budding comic book artists took some inspiration!

 

Storytelling Group

We also continued our weekly storytelling group this month. Over the last few weeks we had been working with Lego and some other crafty materials to create our own characters. Once we had done this, we then gave them a back story, including a habitat, likes/dislikes and even thought about any quests or antics they would get up to. There were some excellent creations with one of out pupils even drawing out a whole map of their characters’ world!

A good not too bad terrible news…

The school library is getting refurbished!

In October, the school informed me that the library will be getting refurbished! It was a project pending since last year and couldn’t believe it was going ahead. But this time, it appeared to be more concrete since they gave me a frame time. The work will be done in approximately four weeks.

So, I started to invite ALL the S1 and S2 classes to come in, to borrow as many books as possible. The more they borrow the less I have to pack.

Later, I gathered my little army of minions AKA the library helpers to organise the work and to start packing. Pupils selected books by subjects to then been delivered in every department of the school:

 

The rest of the books were packed in boxes to be kept in a storage room:

 

The library helpers did an amazing job! In less than a week the whole library was packed!! We celebrated by having a small cupcake party:

The library cleared, the real work could finally start:

I’m really looking forward to welcome pupils and staff back into a beautiful new brand library!!

#Breakingnews: it appears that it will take more time than announced…Keep posted!

 

 

November updates!

Welcome back to the Gaelic School blog!

We have had a lot on recently, with more to come in the coming months. Check back here for news on author visits, Book week Scotland and other library-related news.

Storytelling for Mental Health

We are finally underway with our Storytelling group! Over the course of the school year, our  group will be engaging in various storytelling-related activities including games, crafts, reading and much much more. Aside from mental health, a key theme of the group is ‘diversity’. We will be giving updates on what the group have been up to here, so don’t miss it!

For our first session, we got everyone to pair off, tell each other an amusing or interesting story about themselves and the other had to re-tell it but be…economical with the truth. It was a lot of fun and we had some excellent stories. As with every session, we get the pupils to describe how they are feeling in one word at the start and end by scanning a QR code (pictured) and entering it into a linked form.

 

 

Book Tok display

Introducing our new permanent display: Book Tok! Come down and find some of the top trending books and authors.

St. Andrew’s Wee Write trip!

Class 1.2 have been excellent users of the library this year. So to reward them, we thought we’d arrange for them to meet a real life author at the Wee Write festival in the Mitchell Library!

We went to a talk/workshop by writer Alex Malarky and, needless to say, everyone had a great time. We listened to Alex talk a bit about her book, including a short reading, and our young people even got the chance to create their own adventure story!

 

We’ve been a bit quiet recently due to exams going on in the library but please do return for more exciting updates!

Wee Write! @ the Gaelic School!

This year, the school were involved in two Wee Write! events!

For the first one, we had Johan Nic a’Ghobiann visit the school to give a talk to our S2s:

We also went with our S1s to the Mitchell for an event with illustrator Chris Mould who talked about his new illustrated version of George Orwell’s Animal Farm. He also gave us plenty of tips to improve our own drawing skills.

(apologies for the poor quality photos!)

Watch this space for my exciting updates next month!

LGBTQ+ History Month @ Sgoil Ghàidhlig Ghlaschu!

Hi and welcome to our LGBTQ+ History special!

As you can see, we have displayed some excellent books which deal with LGBT themes or feature leading LGBT characters or protagonists. Some are more ‘obvious’ than others, but we hope there is something for everyone here!

Thanks to the LGBTQ+ group for their suggestions! There were some that even caught the librarian off-guard! We have put up some posters (see below) of some of their recommendations. If you can’t find them in the library, most are available on the Libby app (email gwmcgregormark@glow.ea.glasgow.sch.uk if you need more info on this!). We are always looking for more recommendations so please get in touch if you have any that haven’t been mentioned here.

The next update will be for World Book Day on March 3rd. We are hoping to have quizzes, giveaways and much more!

February @ St. Andrew’s!

Hi everyone! Welcome to our first full month of normal service!

This month is LGBT History Month and we have a display of some great books which relate to LGBTQ+ issues or contain LGBTQ+ characters and protagonists. It’s a very eclectic mix and some are more ‘obvious’ than others, but we hope that there is something for everyone. Plus, there is a free rainbow bookmark with every book borrowed!

This month also brings us Languages Week Scotland as well as International Mother Language Day so what better time to set up our new Community Languages Section! We have a number of new books in French, Polish, Italian, Spanish and Arabic (most of which didn’t last long before pupils snapped them up!). We are hoping to have more in the not-so-distant future but we reckon this is a good start! Also special thanks to our EAL group for creating a new multilingual. ‘Welcome’ sign for the library.

3rd March is World Book Day and we have lots of exciting things planned, including a book cover competition, a book swap and much more. Our next update will be a WBD special so keep your eyes pealed!

 

Bliadhna Mhath Ùr!

Welcome back to the Glasgow Gaelic School blog!

2022 will hopefully bring us an array of exciting events and updates to the library. We have been working with the Art department in adding a bit of colour and beauty to the library and have decided to use the space to showcase some pupil artwork. As you can see below, there are some excellent examples here:

We have also been working with the pupil-led school magazine, who have their weekly meeting in the library on Thursdays. There are lots of great things coming out of it and the young people are doing a great job of contributing and organising. If you are interested, please get in touch with me on gw19mcgregormark@glow.ea.glasgow.sch.uk and I will p ass this onto the magazine’s editor, Sophie (S6). Also, look out for the library segment for more updates and reading recommendations!

January 27th also marks Holocaust Memorial Day. A day on which we draw attention to and raise awareness of the Holocaust and all genocides across the world. We have set up a display of related books (below) which we will leave up for the next few weeks. Also, check out the Glasgow School Librarian eMag for further reading!

Next month will be LGBT History Month and we hope to bring you further news, recommendations and happenings in the library. See you then!