Inquiry Blog Post #1: Let Them Read Books!

I suppose the whole book thing has been popular for awhile now, which makes our jobs as TLs pretty easy. Really, reading promotion is basically a cakewalk. The way I see it, one simply  needs to troll around for a handful of good ideas and then start implementing one or two. Thank goodness for the Internet.

One of the most helpful resources I've used over the years is Saskatchewan School Library's "50 Ways to Love Your Library." It's super. Herein lies a giant list of ideas, which are bound to get your creative juices pumping. I for one, am a firm believer in getting in and getting dirty in your library. When the feathers settle, no matter what you've done exactly, the kids are going to be pumped, the teachers are going to be pumped, and the parents are going to be pumped because things are happening. Really, that's all it takes. A little passion and a lot of follow through.

Aaron's zombie movie serves as a prime example. The movie is not perfect. Instead, it's awesome because it has heart and shows character, and we and the students who view it know that Aaron had to organise a bunch of teenagers into zombie formation for the shooting of this film. Awesome.

I created a similarly zany video (kudos to Leah, who is in this course, in the Bears Group (Go Bears!) in fact, and was the star of this video last year). Before Halloween, Leah and I and a couple other teachers from our school shot a video in the library. We chose the form of a newscast. Leah, as Russian correspondent, Helga, brought the viewers past the police tape, into the scene to view a body (Grade 7 teacher, Mark) dead in a library aisle. The clip ended with a desperate plea from the principal for students to solve this mystery. The video aired on morning announcements. Students came into the library at breaks and lunch to witness a crime scene and to receive clues as to who did it, with what, and to whom.

They were so into it.

Does this promote reading in the library? Pwphhh (sound of disgust)! Of course! The killer was a character (Willy Wonka) and the deceased was too (Peetah). Beyond that, our library was becoming a place of excitement. A place where things happened. A place where the lines between real and imagination blurred; more than one grade six student stopped me in the hall to enquire as to whether or not someone has ACTUALLY died in the library. Meanie that I am, I just looked frazzled and said, I need your help, come at lunch. 

Books are not boring. We need to tell and show the people!

Sadly, I no longer have a copy of the video and so cannot post it. What I can show you, is a video I made of my team competing in our district-wide middle school Battle of the Books. Hugely promotional. Hugely fun. (students signed off for the sharing of this video, btw.)

Bring in authors! And if you can connect the author event to another event or piece of learning, even better. Last year I ran a reading competition around Seven the Series, and then brought in Ted Stauton for an author talk. (Ok. Not easy. I ended up arranging Ted Stauton and Richard Scrimnger's Island itineraries, complete with transportation via teacher librarians, just to get them out here.) This was really fun. The kids were foaming at the collective mouth to get at any copy of Seven the Series.

They were reading!

Access opportunities like ArtsStarts and bring in an author to do writing workshops. I was privileged to work with Robin Stevenson on such a project this fall. In this case, the kids were reading and writing. Robin brought friends. I gave writing prompts and they wrote along with the kids and shared their work over the PA (along with the kids).

Another fun event, introduced to me by a colleague, is the Human Library. I was able to throw one of these together last year, and my goodness, it was so rewarding. Now, this isn't specifically a reading event. Rather, we do a lot of talking. But I think this is a good place to point out that our reading cultures should stretch beyond print to embrace many types of literacies. The more we can open up our libraries, the further we can reach.

All this said, it seems for every idea I'm able to follow through on, there's about ten that I don't squeeze in. We can't do everything. As TLs, we all have different gifts and intuitions. I'm realising what works for me in my library, is going to look different than what's happening one school over. Whatever. As long as things are happening. We need to create a buzz. Our libraries need to be the hive of the school. The flow of students and books and resources and ideas can be fast and furious as long as we're willing to let them.

Images from:
Flickr, Creative Commons
http://www.flickr.com/photos/statelibraryofvictoria_collections/7114730409/sizes/n/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/statelibraryofvictoria_collections/6968649976/sizes/l/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/statelibraryofvictoria_collections/6968650522/sizes/l/