The new school year has begun, and our library is Rocking! Remember the old days when school librarians would wait until the second or even third week of school to open their library, not the case anymore. To provide access we must be open from the first day!
1. Open the library over the summer with a summer reading program!
We had a chance to open our library on Thursday afternoons over the summer. This was a great opportunity to meet students and their parents before the school year began. On the first day of school students were ready to check out new books or renew the ones they checked out over the summer. Students were able to blog on the media center blog over the summer. We had 300 plus posts of book reviews, and we hosted a Summer Reading Ice Cream Celebration the 2nd week of school for students who blogged!
2. Start your daily broadcast the 1st day of school!
Last year was my first facilitating the OWLS TV program. So, this year I brought a few kids in during pre-planning and we were ready to go live on the first day of school! It was so exciting to have this flurry of activity in the library on the first day, not to mention the chance to pitch our media programs to the whole school right away.
3. Get classes in for checkout right away!
I talked with my English teachers and invited their classes in for checkout starting the 2nd day of school. You'd think they would want to get their classroom procedures down, but their main focus is to get books in the hands of their students, so they jumped at the opportunity! The excitement over books put the perfect spin on a new year.
4. Open before school even on the 1st day!
My doors opened at 7:30 on the first day of school and there were 50 plus kids in the library by 8:10. As classes came for checkout I promoted the library as a place to "hang" in the morning and by the second week of school we have over 100 kids each morning. They play the Wii, prepare for morning broadcast, use the computers for work and gaming, check out books, read, play chess, work on our community puzzle, or just hang out with their friends.
5. Meet with teachers on collaboration ASAP!
Within the first few weeks of school I have had a chance to start planning collaborate lessons with many of my teachers! It's very important to get out to the teachers' collaborative planning meetings, build relationships with your faculty, and jump on any chance you get to offer resources or collaborative teaching opportunities. Our teachers are very busy so it is important that we help them! I'm working on a pathfinder and curating from the Internet on topics related to the American Revolution for a collaborative unit for a Hollywood vs. History Extended Learning Time Class. They will be in Thursday to get started on their research and learn about digital literacy project options they will be able to choose from to present the findings of the research!
What are other suggestions for ROCKING your library during the 1st weeks of school?
