Welcome Parents & Students K-3!

Welcome to the Memorial School Library! This post will be up on our Smart Board tonight to introduce the School Library Blog By-The-Sea. Each week I will post a message indicating activities and events that have taken place in the library or are planned for the future. I hope you will check in on this blog regularly to see what we have going on here and I hope you'll make comments on the blog. (see Comments button below.)

Information literacy (our goal here at the library) comes in many forms. Blogging is just one of the tools many of our students will be introduced to this school year. It's a great communication tool between the school and home. It also provides a great way for students to practice their writing and comprehension skills. We hope your whole family will become bloggers and add the School Library Blog By-The-Sea to your list of "Favorites" on your computer!

Enjoy the Open House and as always...Happy Reading!

Can You Say BUSY?!

School is well underway and everyone is settling into schedules. We've been really busy ramping up for Podcast projects...Mrs. Heslop's class is getting ready to make podcasts of Eric Carle Book Reviews. Mrs. Fleming's third grade is busy researching famous authors and will be presenting bibliographies of the authors via podcasts too! Mrs. Fenton's class just began to research different Presidents of the United States. They'll be working in small groups the next few weeks leading up to the presidential election. And, next week the fourth graders will begin researching U.S. landmarks for Power Point Presentations they will be making to teach their fellow classmates.

The weather has turned and it's the perfect time to curl up with a good book on these chilly days. Enjoy and happy reading....

Time Flies...

When you're having fun and this week went at rocket speed! Students have been coming in for book exchange and enjoying all the new books that the library has to offer. The good news is, there are many more new books to come. Most popular picks have been the graphic novels and books on Barack Obama(!). There are so many new, interesting projects that are getting started and I've been busy preparing for them. In the coming weeks, Mrs. Fleming's class will kick off a pilot program where they conduct Author Studies and then share their learning via podcasts! Mrs. Heslop's class will try out the hip, happening podcast technology when they produce Book Reviews of Eric Carle titles. Mrs. Seymour has been busy introducing students to blogs including this one and the votes are coming in on whether or not we should re-name Reading Central (the school library)- it looks like the majority of voters think we should rename it! Now we'll have to get to work to think up a new name.
I'm looking forward to Monday morning's Volunteer Orientation (at 9am in the Library - ALL ARE WELCOME). I am hopeful that we'll have lots of new volunteers to help get our work done in the library. Well that's it for now! Until next week which I'm guessing will fly by even faster...happy reading!

Library Rules...By Our Kindergartners

Today I was happy to welcome in Mrs. Manninen and Mrs. Grella's Kindergarten classes. I introduced myself and got to put names and faces together...and what bright, sweet faces they are! I showed the children my "To Do" list. It's SUPER long - so they took pity on me and agreed to help me out with one of my most pressing tasks, the rules for the Library.

We talked about all kinds of different things to remember when visitng the library and when taking a library book home. Here's the final list these brilliant students came up with:

MEMORIAL SCHOOL LIBRARY RULES

1. No running in the library.

2. Use inside voices only.

3. Return books on time.

4. Respect teachers and other students and

users of the library.

5. Keep books clean, dry, and safe from pets, food

and little brothers & sisters.

Now I can cross that off my list! Getting my work done with all those helpers was easy and fun! If only they'd work for me full time...that reminds me, I am still hoping more parents or grandparents will sign up to volunteer at the library. A Volunteer Meeting is scheduled for 9am, Monday, September 15th. Hope to see you there!

Week One...And Still Standing!

It's been great to welcome all of the children back and see the excited new faces of the Kindergarteners! The week flew by - as it always seems to - and we've finished it off with a BANG here at the Library...
Jean Marzollo, author of the popular "I Spy " and "Shanna" series as well as dozens of other children's books, visited with grades K through 2. Mrs. Marzollo is the great aunt of Peter (K) and Allen (Gr 2) Martin and was kind enough to donate her time to speak about creating "I Spy" books and introduce us to her new E-picture books. You can access these (free) interactive "story game books" on her website http://www.jeanmarzollo.com/. The site has books that can be read to the viewer or that the viewers can read themselves and it has lots of fun (learning)games. This visit was a huge treat and enjoyed by all! Special thanks go to Drayton Martin for helping to arrange the visit. Next week, we'll have a slide show of the visit featured on the front page of the Memorial School website so come back then and check it out.
In the meantime, have a great weekend and HAPPY READING!