A nice cosy Friday out of the gales

Well, that's my first week back almost finished. I thought someone was being really kind to me and had laid on nice fresh coffee this morning - until I realized that it was just the remains of yesterdays Head Teacher's meeting refreshments. Thanks and a PPP point each to Connor McLintock & Jamie McIver for helping me tidy up.
Quite a lot of this morning was taken up with arranging a Staff Reading Group meeting for next Friday - we will be discussing "The Bluest Eye" by Toni Morrison (I guess I'd better read it soon!) - and I've put a note out for suggestions for next month's book.
Apart from normal admin stuff (why do I get THREE of Mr McIlvanney's English classes on a Friday?) I've also started to work on our Spring Read promotion. HOT NEWS - Catherine MacPhail (Nemesis, Roxy's Baby, Missing, etc) will be visiting us on 18th March to give a talk. Start saving up now if you want to buy one of her books so she can sign it for you!
Catch y'all next week....
SK

Back at last!

Well, I'm just finding my feet again after being off for 5 weeks (including 2 for Christmas) after my hand operation. How can I forget so much in 5 weeks? And the work has really piled up - will take a bit of time to get straight. Nice how everyone's been pleased to see me back though.

The LRC is closed today because we've got the Head Teacher's meeting on today - all 9 heads from the 9 East Ayrshire Secondary schools. So, best behaviour! I'm off out this afternoon to the new Grange Academy to meet up with the other 8 School Librarians (well, 7 actually, because the Cumnock post is vacant at present) for our once - per - term meeting. Hopefully we'll be discussing the Spring Read promotion and find out which authors will be coming to talk to us.

A bit of a strange day today really, what with the LRC being closed, me being out in the afternoon, then early evening I'm off to Loudoun Academy for the S4 Parent's evening (I've two children in S4). Then later in the evening to Darvel Library for my monthly Book Group meeting (this month we've been reading No Time to Say Goodbye by Linwood Barclay - really good!)

So unfortunately I won't be able to attend this Evening's Burns Night Dinner - shame really, I would have liked that!

That's all for now folks, catch you later

SK

The Blog is back!

Hi folks, here's my first ever blog on the KA site. Just a quick one this time - to test, as much as anything else. Keep viewing for up to date news on happenings in the Library!

East Ayrshire Readers' Cup - Second Round

The Second Round of the East Ayrshire Readers' Cup has been held. The best 4 of all S1 and S2 classes had to take part in a children's literary quiz. First years met in the Assembly Hall on March the 4th to answer 10 questions on Comics/Superheroes, Sports, Roald Dahl and Lucky Dip whilst S2 pupils took their turn on March the 7th with 10 questions on Crime and Detective stories, Scottish connections, Darren Shan and Lucky Dip. I was the quiz mistress and S6 pupils operated the PowerPoint and took the scores. In between rounds, spot questions were put to the audience for prizes. At the end of the competition, 1P3 and 2W were the winners, each receiveing a £5 book token. All the team members received a goodie bag.

World Book Day, Thursday March the 6th

• Celebrate reading on Thursday March the 6th. Every pupil will receive a World Book Day book token for £1 to buy the specially produced £1 books or to put towards any book.



• S6 pupils are organising the Great Media Sale on Thursday the 6th of March during lunchtime in A9. Books, comics, magazines, videos, DVDs, etc will be on sale. Be there! Search your house and bring any unwanted items for the sale to the LRC before Thursday.



• World Book Day competitions have been organised for pupils and for teachers, The winners will be announced next week.



• Calling S1 and S2 pupils! Support your teams this week since the Second Round of the East Ayrshire Readers' Cup will be held in the Assembly Hall, S1 on Tuesday March the 4th and S2 on Friday March the 7th.
  
  

Spring Read

East Ayrshire school librarians are busy organising their second book festival, Spring Read, to celebrate World Book Day which this year falls on Thursday the 6th of March. Four teenage authors are visiting various schools during March. On Tuesday the 4th of March, 20 S3 pupils will be visiting Grange Academy to hear the performance poet, Janet Paisley. She will be talking about plays and poems. Then, on World Book Day itself, a group of 10 S1 pupils will be visitng Stewarton Academy to hear Cathy Cassidy talk about her writings. She is always a favourite and is fairly local since she lives down in Dumfriesshire. The third author, Nicola Morgan, is coming to our school on Friday the 14th of March at which there will be 20 of our S2 pupils and pupils from Grange, James Hamilton, St. Joseph's and Stewarton Academies . Nicola will be talking about some of her books. Finally, 20 S1 pupils will be going to St. Joseph's Academy to hear Catherine MacPhail talk about writing and her books. Catherine has been coming to East Ayrshire schools for a number of years and pupils always love listening to her.

Holocaust Memorial Day

On Friday January the 25th at lunchtime, we commemorated the Holocaust Memorial Day in the Library Resource Centre. Amidst a candlelit setting, we explored this year's theme "Imagine...remember, reflect and react". A group of S6 pupils, Johanna Tudhope, Liam Baillie, Fiona Adrain, Caroline Hyslop and David McIlwraith, prepared readings imagining we were in Germany and Poland before World War II, in Cambodia during the time of the Khymer Rouge, in Rwanda during the genocide and in present day United Kingdom as an asylum seeker. Each pupil told a story of an individual during these times. Finally, Lesley Roy read the evocative poem "Night" by Elie Weisel telling of his arrival as a boy at Auchswitz.