With 2012 Australia’s National Year of Reading, I know a lot of teacher librarians (while still on holidays) are planning a range of events and programs to promote the importance of developing literacy skills of students and their parents as well as fostering a love of reading.
In the School libraries 21C: School library futures project report Ross Todd and I wrote in 2010 for the New South Wales Department of Education & Training’s School Libraries & Information Literacy Unit (Curriculum K–12 Directorate), we identified eight (8) principles underpinning 21C school library design as an instructional zone of which ‘literary learning’ was one:
A centre that supports literary learning, where students become immersed in imaginary worlds, explore personal reading interests, develop sustained voluntary reading practices, develops reading for meaning and independence as critically-capable readers literary learning. (p.16)
More of my musings on literary learning can be found in my post ‘Emily Rodda, Lu Rees Archives & literary learning‘.
So what motivated me to write this morning? Waking up to an email that contained the URL to this new YouTube clip which captures the magic of books, even in a time where e-formats are gaining much popularity.
I just love this clip! I think this clip would make a great feature on any school library website to promote the National Year of Reading.
For those just starting out, here’s a few places to check out:
National Year of Reading 2012 – official website
Love2read – the official National Year of Reading Facebook page
The love2read wiki – this is where information about a lot of projects and events is being recorded, and heaps of links to websites and resources for ideas
Join in The Amazing Read – a Twitter reading group for 2012. Share what you are reading over summer with others, promote reading events you are organising, follow the hashtag #NYR12 to see what others are doing – check out the tweetfeed for starters and follow @love2read on Twitter.
Australia’s National Year of Reading 2012 is a great opportunity for teacher librarians to keep school libraries on the public’s ‘radar’. What are you planning to promote the great work of school libraries and TLs in supporting student learning?
Following up on the importance of reading, Anne Kreamer’s article ‘The Business Case for Reading Novels’ (Harvard Business Review, 11 Jan, 2012) http://blogs.hbr.org/cs/2012/01/the_business_case_for_reading.html presents cognitive psychology research supporting the benefits of reading fiction. #NYR12