Book Review- When Friendship Followed Me Home

When Friendship Followed Me Home by Paul Griffin, is an intense first person tale of love and loss that will have you shedding tears for twelve year old protagonist Ben Coffin.  When we meet Ben he's been rescued from lonely foster kid status by a wonderful woman who has adopted him and they've created a family together that's full of love and laughter and shared good times. And, despite troubles in his school life, Ben makes a new friend in the unique and creative Halley and has just been followed home by an adorable dog. Unfortunately, these happy set of circumstances don't last and Ben's world is shattered by devastating news. Join Ben, Halley and the little dog Flip on their journey through sadness and story telling as they create a novel together that gets them through terrible times. Ben and Halley's book gets them through tough times, and this book will help you if you've ever experienced tough times yourself. Several paws up for When Friendship Followed Me Home.

Online Safety Video

What do you think about this video?

For the Love of Reading!

Showing some love for our Learning Commons! Scan here or Google Simon Cunningham Library for links to our ebooks and great online resources like Tumblebooks.

Tinkering with Technology

The technology club is exploring the maker movement. Tinkering with a broken Wii is a start!

Comic Life Instructions on how to access ebooks!

This is a document I made last year for showing proper iPad care. This is still relevant after a year of using iPads! Most students are very respectful of the mighty iPad but some need gentle reminders.

Seeing a 3D printer being demonstrated in the Learning Commons makes me think about all the possibilities of projects in the future. The maker movement (google it!) points to the importance of play and tinkering in student learning. Someone had to play to make something as interesting as a 3D printer!

The Learning Commons Evolves! Last week I started reflecting on how far the Learning Commons has come. What occasioned my thoughts was looking around on Thursday afternoon and realizing that I had not only two gade two classes in with their teachers for collaborative project, but also UBC student teachers observing, kids trickling in for book exchange, a parent volunteer shelving, and a teacher using one of the computers! Everyone was on task and using the space harmoniously: the Learning Commons operating at full steam! The grade two classes were working on a way for everyone to show their thinking simultaneously and in real time using padlet, the Scan app, Apple TV and their knowledge of bees! This project is a great example of the evolution of the Learning Commons because it started with one teacher approaching me and saying she'd heard of another teacher in the district using the iPads and a scan App to write on the same virtual blackboard together and she'd like to try it but didn't really know how it worked. I didn't either but did some research and figured out how we could do it! Then another grade two teacher heard about our plan and asked to be involved. &nbsp;So I set up a "wall" using the Web 2.0 tool padlet (it used to be called Wallwisher- I'd explored it a bit in its previous incarnation). I labelled it What I Know About Bees and projected it using Apple TV. Then kids came up in pairs and scanned the QR code that padlet generates for each wall which brought up the same wall for everyone to write on. We had to talk about what happens if you write silly things, but that was a good lesson too! The picture is of our second session on What I Wonder About Bees. The Learning Commons continues to evolve and flourish.</p>

It's been a long time since my last Learning Commons blog post! Starting the second year of Learning Commons has been an exciting endeavour. Coming back to a school that I already know positions the Learning Commons concept as a work in progress rather than something to start from scratch like it was lt September. This year I feel that some of the ideas we started last year will come more into fruition. Already we've got teachers coming in to do collaborative projects- the Learning Commons really a place where we work together and learn from each other! And next week the technology club will resume, bringing enthusiasm and student directed ideas to what happens here.&nbsp;

Vision Statement

Here, at long last, is a vision of what the Learning Commons should be:

The Learning Commons should be a place, both physical and virtual, that is open and accessible to learning. It should be where teachers, students and parents feel comfortable and have a sense of shared ownership for the learning that happens. It is a place of collaboration, where teachers and students meet, work, teach and learn together. The learning commons is still a library, where students access, read and borrow books, but it's also a place where students can come to work independently, and where multiple groups of users can co-exist. Flexibility of space and of attitude are key to the Learning Commons. The physical spaces should be customizable to meet the needs of a variety of users. 

    

Learning in the Learning Commons happens on the floor, on the tables, on the comfy chairs, and through the Internet, around the world!

Scaredy Squirrel is missing and the rest of the reading buddies miss him! There will be a reward for his return! Please help the Scaredy Squirrel Reading Buddy get back to the Learning Commons!

Four Word Book Review by grade one student Willis

Div 20's grade one class did four word book reviews today. Students chose a book they like, took a picture using the Skitch App and then added the four most important words they could think of to describe the book. I was very impressed with the creativity possible with just four words! We did have a discussion about words that might be more descriptive than than just cool and awesome.

And here's an example from the grade three students of Div. 12's  These are Five Word Book Reviews; we added one more word for the grade three kids and more complex vocabulary.

Making stop motion animation films! Toys, whiteboards, an iPad and some creative kids= storytelling magic.

We heart our new QR code!

Our new QR code for the library website!

Comfortable, durable seats!

New comfortable, portable seats make for more flexible learning spaces. This is probably the only picture of them unoccupied!

The answer is... This year will be the Year of the Snake!

Nous avons lu les livres Attention Intimidation et nous avons écrit ce que on peut faire dans cette situation.

The Kindergarten class of Div. 24 read Kathryn Otoshi's Zero and then helped the character Zero feel not so lonely by filling her up with other numbers!

Here are some of the projects we're working on: the grade 5 and 6 kids in Div.6 and 7 are using iMovie to make films illustrating one of the 30 Human Rights they've been studying. They're learning about creative presentation of information, video editing and how to work in groups. Grade 3 and 4 students in Div. 11 and 13 made books on the Book Creator App all about themselves. We're using Apple TV to show the finished projects titled Qui-suis je? for the french class and Who Am I? for the English group. Other classes are doing 6 word stories, using the Comic Life App, where they take a picture and write a meaningful story in just six words. And the Kindergarten class of Div. 22 used the sock puppet App to model the patterns in "Brown Bear Brown Bear What Do You See" using animals and colours found in other library books. They loved recording their voices!