Students at St Michael’s Primary School arrived dressed in vastly different attire on Thursday when they came disguised as their favourite book character to celebrate book week.
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Teacher librarian Barbara McKenna said the children were able to celebrate illustrators and authors and the day promoted a love of reading.
“If kids have the opportunity to bring books to life, I think it resonates a little bit more with them and it’s a lasting memory of something fun at school,” she said.
Mrs McKenna said children tended to enjoy paper books over digital versions.
“In actual fact the sales of paperback books have increased and digital books have decreased over the last 12 months in Australia,” she said.
Each day five classes visit St Michael’s library, with sessions lasting 45 to 50 minutes.
“Our first focus is literacy and encouraging a real love of literature. So we encourage all the children to borrow and that way it teaches them to become responsible learners and responsible for looking after their belongings,” Mrs McKenna said.
“Often it is the first time they have ever chosen books in their lives and that’s a huge thing.”
Children are also taught to look after and use books appropriately.
“A lot of children come to us without knowledge of how to look after or use a book, then we find our way around the library, so they’re learning the Dewey Decimal System, because our libraries are still organised that way and then we read to the children,” Mrs McKenna said.
“With older children we have activities which encourage research and we have a book talk, where they discuss what they are reading. That’s a huge thing in developing what they like to read and it allows me as a librarian to find out what they’re reading, what they’re interested in and how we can best support the children with buying books for the library.”
