World Book Day is coming – Thursday 5th March 2015

The World Book Day website is packed with new resources including the World Book Day 2015 Teachers’ Toolkit, The Big Book Off and 4 brand new videos in The Big Little Book Corner.

Click the images below to access resources.

This year’s format for The Biggest Book Show on Earth is a series of Virtual Author Workshops – short videos featuring authors such as Michael Morpurgo, Chris Riddell, David McKee and Holly Smale. Click here for more information and register to view them on-demand when they become available.

This post, inspired by a visit to Culloden Academy Library, is a follow on to Friday’s post – The Power of a Library Card . . . Part 1. Thank you to Michelle Gowans, Network Librarian, who flagged up the following resource.

Trying to provide a wealth of texts for Reading for Enjoyment, particularly magazines, it can be tricky (and expensive) to keep your class collection up to date. Using a High Life Highland Library card to create a free account, you can access 50 of the most popular magazine titles on computers, tablets and mobile devices.

Titles include – ‘Astronomy’; ‘Cycling’; ‘Golf Monthly’ and the ‘National Geographic’. A great way of engaging children and young people who are keen on reading non-fiction texts.

Setting up an account

You must create two accounts, both a library magazine account AND a Zinio account to download and read magazines. Register on the libraries digital magazine web page and set-up a Zinio account, follow our instructions for first time users and then read our Zinio Download Guide.

CLICK HERE – Digital Magazine – First Time User Guide
CLICK HERE – Digital Magazines – User Guide
CLICK HERE – High Life Highland – Digital Magazines

This post was inspired by a visit to Culloden Academy Library. Thank you to Michelle Gowans, Network Librarian, who flagged up the following resource.

Did you know that you can use your High Life Highland Library card to access 2,200 newspapers across the world for free?

Whether it be a guided reading lesson extracting information or examining the writer’s techniques, a critical literacy lesson looking at persuasion and bias, or a research skills lesson where learners are sourcing information from texts – Press Display provides access to the lesson stimulus.

How to access Press Display

1. Visit the Press Display Website http://library.pressdisplay.com
2. Login using your barcode/library card number and click ‘Login’.
   (Please enter the 14-digit barcode number on the back of your library card. If you have a smart card starting 63360 or  6337, please enter the first 14-digits only, leaving off the last two digits.)
3. You should now be logged into Press Display. (If you cannot log in using your borrower card please contact us.)
4. Hover over ‘Select Title’ at the top of the page on the right hand side to select your newspaper by country, language or by title.

CLICK HERE – Press Display website
CLICK HERE – Press Display User Guide
CLICK HERE – High Life Highland – Press Display Information

• Do you know your Network Librarian?
• Do you know how your Network Librarian can support literacy developments in your class/school?

If not, click the image above to access the up to date list of Network Librarians and drop your Network Librarian an email.

Last night I was invited to a wonderful event at Crown Primary School, ‘Reading by the Campfire’.

A class of children arrived at an indoor campsite (which they no longer recognised as their classroom), dressed in their pyjamas and ready to hear and share some wonderful stories.

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The children stopped in at a number of tents on their visit, filled with blankets and torches and greeted by an array of different books along their journey. Keeping warm beside the Smartboard fire (including authentic crackling sound effects), children read to and with each other and to and with their parents/carers.

A great idea to support parental involvement in Literacy – the pictures speak for themselves. Who could say no to a hot chocolate and marshmallows . . . ?

When developing Shared or Guided reading this week, support learners to think within, beyond and about the text. Use these questions as a guide.

Use the Developing Thinking and Reading Between the Lines PowerPoints and the information on Bloom’s Taxonomy, De Bono’s Six Hats and SOLO Taxonomy to further explore Higher Order Thinking Skills (HOTS).

Thanks to Anne at The Learning Zoo for bringing this to our attention.

Choral Reading is a strategy that can be used to develop fluency; this is a strategy many practitioners use already in some form. Watch a fantastic example of Choral Reading below:

The objective of Choral Reading is to build pace when reading aloud. Learners – working in pairs, trios or small groups – should be given a text that is separated into small chunks. Each reader should be allocated sections that they read independently and sections that they read in unison. This should be read in sequence, providing learners with an opportunity to develop expression, rhythm and volume.

Want to try it out in the classroom?
CLICK HERE – The Three-Headed Dog by Claire Bevan

The Reading section on Adrian Bruce’s website is a gem of a find full of ideas, games and printables to support the teaching of reading. Definitely worth a wander through the tabs at the top of the page. I particularly like the Hidden Questions section which has resources to support the teaching of making inferences.

CLICK HERE – Adrian Bruce Reading Games

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Quite often we’ll ask children to “Put your thinking cap on”. Empowering learners with the skills to think creatively and critically is a gift which we can facilitate as teachers. The Developing Thinking and Reading Between the Lines PowerPoints in the Literacy Toolkit provide professional learning resources for staff to engage with materials that promote thinking.

Many of our posts have referred to the work of Bloom; however, when I was at an Active Literacy CPD session in Falkirk before Christmas, the Six Hat materials were mentioned during a round table discussion.

Edward de Bono’s Six Thinking Hats is a tool which can be used by practitioners to promote thinking. Each hat colour represents a different aspect of thinking.

Some of the resources, tailored to middle/upper Primary and Secondary, suggest physically wearing coloured representations of the hats when beginning to engage with the materials. This way, learners are physically moving between the hats; therefore they are moving between the different modes of thinking.

There are banks of free resources that are available to support the teaching of thinking skills using the De Bono’s Six Hats materials. The Six Hats materials can be used in conjunction with other Higher Order Thinking materials. Check out the resources below:

CLICK HERE – Using Six Hats as a reflection tool
CLICK HERE – Using the Six Hats to Respond to Literature
CLICK HERE – Six Hats Display
CLICK HERE – Thinking Display
CLICK HERE – FREE De Bono Thinking Resources

Using media is integral in developing our learners’ 21st Century Literacy skills. One way of promoting the use of media is through the use of a film club or Interdisciplinary Film Project within your school.

Has your school got a Film Club? Have you thought about starting up a film club, but didn’t know how?

The Into Film Club website houses ideas on how to use film and media in the classroom and how to create a film club in your school.

Into Film clubs are completely free for Highland Schools working with young people aged 5-19, joining Into Film provides your school with:
Free Amazon LOVEFiLM by post account
Access to free online resources to use in or outside the classroom
Filmmaking support and advice
Access to in-school visits from filmmaking professionals
Regular filmmaking competitions
Weekly review writing competitions
Priority festival booking

Check out our Media Literacy section of the blog for more information on using media in the classroom.