LIBRARY
The school library is part of your school’s teaching and learning environment. It provides resources and services that support students, staff, families and whānau. Your library’s resources, physical space, and staff have tremendous potential to make a difference to students’ achievement, educational equity, and their social and emotional well-being.
The purpose of your school library is to help every member of your school community — students, staff, families and whānau — gain new knowledge, skills, and dispositions for learning and personal development that they will use throughout their lives.
Library/Information Centre
At Waipukurau Primary School we are fortunate to have a bright and welcoming library. It is a hub of learning during class time and is well stocked.
The library is included in our school-wide computer network so students and teachers can access it from their rooms.
Our school Library Assistant oversees the smooth operation of the Library.
The library is available for class teachers who wish to send children there to develop research skills, to use the reference section or to select additional reading material.
Each class visits the library at least once a week enabling the children to select recreational reading material that they may also take home to read.
Books are extremely expensive and we wish to protect them to lengthen their lives. You can help by ensuring children have appropriate bags to put their library books in so they are protected from wet togs and towels, leaky drink bottles etc.
We also ask that good care is taken of all library books that go home - being kept out of reach of younger brothers and sisters for example.
If books are lost, an account will be sent asking for a suitable amount of money to help with its replacement - we usually find most books turn up eventually but in fairness to everyone a time limit needs to be set
What makes an effective school library?
The school library is a central hub supporting every student and staff member, as well as parents and whānau. The library combines several elements — library staff, resources, and space. Each of these plays an important part in supporting teaching and learning. School libraries are most effective when these elements combine to form an integrated whole.
An effective school library:
improves student outcomes — collections developed for your unique school community enrich reading and learning programmes
welcomes people in — the library is a safe place, that values and includes students from different cultures and backgrounds
brings people and information together — connections with other libraries and information sources enhance your library’s collections, and help your library staff help users find what they need
embodies the principles of ‘learner agency’ — students having the independence to choose their own reading, and to find resources that help them develop their interests and strengths at their own pace
helps close the education gap — for students who might otherwise be disadvantaged, the library can provide access to the stories, information, and technology they need.
