New books

Spring Book Fair and AMS Readathon 2016

Posted on by msbuck

AMS Spring Book Fair

Volunteers are needed for the Spring book fair from March 14th-18th between 7:45 AM and 3:15 PM.  Our busiest times of day will be from 8:00-8:30 in the morning and 10:30 AM to 1:00 PM during lunches, but classes will also be visiting throughout the day on Monday-Thursday. The book fair will coincide with this year’s Readathon, which will be held on March 15th, beginning during the school day and extending through the after school activity period and into the evening. Volunteers can sign up here: http://www.signupgenius.com/go/10c0b4ca5ac2babfc1-spring1

Our Fall book fair was a huge success, putting over 500 books in students’ hands and raising over $3,000 in Scholastic dollars to support our library program. The Spring book fair promises to be just as successful with some great titles for sale. We were extremely fortunate to have a wonderful group of parents help out with the fall Fair, and we thank you in advance for once again donating your time and energy. Again, click here to sign up to volunteer for the book fair: http://www.signupgenius.com/go/10c0b4ca5ac2babfc1-spring1 or email Ms. Buck, the AMS librarian, at mhbuck@aacps.org for more information.

 

AMS Readathon 2016

On March 15th we will hold our Readathon at Annapolis Middle School. What is a Readathon?, you may ask. It is a reading marathon in which students, parents, teachers, and community members are encouraged to come and read as long as they can! While at the event some serious participants will sit and read the entire time, there will be additional activities for the less-competitive, including Read Alouds, Book “Sales,” and a Reading Café. There will be representatives from community partners such as the Public Library and giveaways of books and more.

One of the highlights is the Read Aloud Room; this will be a great opportunity for all participants to hear selected stories shared by teachers, students, and community members. If you are interested in being a guest reader, please use this link to submit your contact information: https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/FLW7LCY.  

We are also in need of parent volunteers to help monitor students, serve food, and direct activities.  Interested in volunteering but not eager for the spotlight? Please use this link to submit your contact information: https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/FL5KKTB.  

Questions or concerns? Please email Ms. Buck, the AMS librarian, at mhbuck@aacps.org or our literacy coach, Ms. Lerro, at jlerro@aacps.org. Thank you for your support of this exciting  celebration of literacy and the joy our school community finds in reading!

 

Book orders, and how reading can improve our lives

Posted on by msbuck

Well, it’s official – I have ordered new books for this school year.  We have a different focus for ordering each year, which corresponds to our schedule for removing damaged and outdated titles from the library.  So I thought I’d take a few minutes to explain that process.

It often shocks people to hear that we actually take books OUT of our school’s library.  This isn’t something we just do in schools – any kind of library has to periodically reassess its materials in order to respond to the changing needs of its population.  And certainly the 21st century has brought an increased rate of change, as more information is communicated digitally.  We also have to hunt down books that contain information that’s no longer accurate (for instance, books about Germany that talk about East and West Germany).  So each year I go through a section of the library book by book.  It’s  a supplement to our inventory process, in which we scan each book in the library each year to make sure we’ve got the books the computer thinks are there.  The weeding process is a lot more in-depth; I pick up each book, look it over, flip through it, and assess the content based on its currency, accuracy, reading level, and relevance to our curriculum.  I also look at how frequently and when it’s been checked out.  That way, I can cut dead weight out of our collection and make room for new, shiny, up-to-date books.  Something you notice, when you’re weeding, is how much the way we construct texts has changed.  Books from the 1970s and 1980s or before tend to have big blocks of small print, while new materials are broken into chunks and use pictures and text features to help the reader orient her/himself.  It’s amazing to see the contrast, and our readers are very tuned in to those visual cues when they choose a text.  But weeding also changes the overall feel of the library – gradually but surely, our shelves are starting to be brighter and more attractive.

Here’s a brief rundown on what we’ve got coming in the next few months:

  • 300+ new fiction books
  • 100+ new graphic novels
  • 100+ new high-interest non-fiction titles
  • 75+ new poetry collections
  • 100+ new materials on computing, religion, and philosophy
  • 100+ new picture books

Already available are over 100 new eBooks and eAudio books, including some of the novels we read for class.

As always, if you’re a member of the AMS community and there’s something you’d like to see on our shelves, email me!!

Last but not least, you may have seen this awesome article from the BBC earlier this month about the mental health benefits of reading.  It’s a quick but powerful read and I encourage you to check it out!  AMS teachers and students, it will validate the time you spend in your classrooms doing silent, sustained reading or read-alouds!