My name is Elinor Fenwick and I am a Teacher Librarian from Great Southern Grammar School in Albany, Western Australia. We are a Kindergarten to Year 12(K-12) school with an enrolment of 720 in 2011. This number is going up! We overlook the Kalgan River and are known as "The School of the Sea." We have been operating for 11 years and have grown very quickly. You can see more on our website. Just Google Great Southern Grammar.
I teach year eight and nine IT (Information Technology) classes, library skills to the Early Childhood classes (K-Year 2), inquiry based learning to classes that book into the library, and supervise Year 12 students on study periods. I have a year 10 Homeroom and I am Chair of the school ICT committee.
I am currently trying to complete a Masters in Information Technology (Teacher Librarianship). In my current unit on management I needed to complete a two week practicum, so here I am at the Falcon e-Library and Community Centre with all their wonderful staff, thanks to their team leader Teena Miller.
As I work in a school library this experience is completely different to my normal working environment. I love the feel of this library, the bright open spaces, and the staff have all been so friendly and helpful from the moment I walked in the door.
This is the beginning of my second week, and it is school holidays! I am so impressed with the ammount on offer through the library. The additional meeting rooms mean so much more can be offered. Carmel Sayer runs an excellent after school art program called "A Brush with Art" and the art work on display is amazing.
The "Rhymetime" and "Storytime" sessions offered give parents of young children a great opportunity to immerse their children in language and literature sessions which are so vital to the early reading skills of young children in today's society.
The past week has definitely opened my eyes to the opportunites that the public library provides. I can see how great it would be if school libraries and public libraries collaborated more and finding ways in which I can do this at home in Albany will be one of my goals when I return home.
I am very excited about 2012 being the National Year of Reading! Mandurah libraries are well on their way to making a feast of activites for this celebration and I am so pleased to have been asked to contribute to some of the planning. More on that at the end of the week.