Nurturing a love of reading is a key focus for all at Margaret Hendry School. The library is considered the heart of the school and is a place of connection, learning and joy for children and the community. Families access the library in a similar way to a public library, with over 155 families listed on the family borrowing system with an ability to borrow 20 books at any one time. This essentially allows families to create a home library that is regularly refreshed with school resources.
The announcement of a snap lockdown required some agile and strategic thinking about the ways in which we could continue to bring books into homes and nurture a love of reading while learning ‘Together Apart’. Our Teacher Librarian, Bridgette, and support team worked together to develop a process which enabled families to request a bundle of books be borrowed into their family account and collected from school. Children’s areas of interests, next steps for learning and potential stretch and challenge points were taken into consideration when putting together these personalised home libraries for children. To date, the school has provided 143 families with over 1430 books. These in home libraries bring to the fore our schools commitment to the key focus of nurturing a love of reading. This approach combined with our family accounts for device loans, has also seen our family borrowing accounts grow to 320. The school will support families to continue to access this service once everyone is back onsite.
Families have commented on the joy on their child’s face when receiving their home library. They have also expressed gratitude to staff for the commitment and time spent on building personalised packs to meet their child’s needs, interests and to also spark curiosity into new concepts and passions.
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