A Look into the Junior School’s Vibrant Learning Commons

September 22, 2023

Uncategorized

GNS

Students shared favourite titles as well as stories about reading and sharing books with relatives and siblings, visits to public libraries and bookstores around the globe! Collectively we read hundreds of books! Keep it up as daily reading is beneficial in so many ways. If you are looking for resources the Canadian Children’s Book Centre is a great site to check out.

September has been busy in our Learning Commons. Students from Kindergarten to Grade 5 all know how to use the scanner and it is impressive how efficiently they can scan their barcode and books! With over 10,000 books to choose from this self service model makes our collection easily accessible to all students. Just a reminder that our GNS barcodes are placed vertically on the front covers and the Greater Victoria Public Library (GVPL) barcodes are placed horizontally. This makes it easy to get books back to the right library! Although our youngest students, Junior Kindergarten and First Steps, do not exchange books they will often help choose from a selection of books to enjoy in their classrooms.

As well as exchanging books, all of our students come for an information literacy lesson each week. We began the year perusing and reviewing the collection, new books purchased and how the books are organized: picture books, chapterbook and series collections(lots of new ones this year) and of course the universal Dewey Decimal System for non-fiction material. We have also begun exploring different ways to look for information. Using the Question Formulation Technique to develop good questions, we are using various types of resources to discuss the concept that information can be presented in many different ways. This exploration also provides a conversation starter as to what other places in our community can be sources of information.

Whether it be asking wonder questions with our littles in First Steps, Junior Kindergarten and Kindergarten, exploring our collection for different genres or fact books to find answers to questions, or just plain sharing a love of reading, our Learning Commons is always a busy place!

For those in Grades 3 to 5 who would like to read digital books we have e-books available through SORA, which can be accessed using the student’s Google username and password. Ask your child about this great resource!

We welcome Nina Mosallaei, our new Librarian Technician. Nina will be at our front desk Tuesday to Friday from 8:30 to 2:00.

Grade 4 Library Squad has begun and these students are excited to plan and share literacy events for our students this year!

Thank you so much for your book donations to our collection. We are always on the lookout for popular series’ (anything by David Walliams, Rick Riordan or J.K. Rowling, or series Wings of Fire, Dragon Masters, Critter Club, Rainbow Fairies, Boy Versus Beast, etc.) and graphic novels (Dogman, Amulet, Guts, Wings of Fire, etc.). These are very popular and it is great to have extra copies on hand.

Please email smcleod@mygns.ca if you have any questions or requests for books you’d like to see in the Beach Drive collection!