Come by for a visit.  Check out our catalog.  I think we have the best library in the District!  For those of you who are new to the school, the library is located in the heart of the school.  Come through the main entrance; pass the stairs to the office and you will find it just beyond the Computer Lab.  All students come for a weekly visit with their classmates.  The schedule is:

Students accompanied by an adult may use the library after school until 3:00 pm on Monday, Tuesday (unless there is a staff meeting), Thursday and Fridays.

The library collection will be significantly improved this year with materials very generously funded by the PTA.  Students, parents and teachers have all made recommendations for titles.  I will update popular series, buy I CAN READ books at the Second Grade level and obtain Everyday Math and Science books to support the curriculum.  We will start a listening library with thirty-one electronic books that will initially stay in the library.  Students will be able read and listen to books simultaneously.  Picture books, short stories, fairy tales from around the world and math titles will be in the initial collection.   these have been road tested, I’ll look into longer texts.  As one third of our students do not speak English as their first language, I am hoping that these units will be helpful for these children and enjoyable for native speakers of English.  I am also considering the purchase of a puppet theater so that your children can create their own stories as well as retell old favorites.

Results from a survey administered in May to Third through Fifth graders showed that by far, the favorite library activity is reading aloud to a partner, a stepping stone to public speaking.  I want to encourage this enthusiasm.

While I am working with the classes, library parent volunteers maintain the facility.  They circulate books, put returned materials back on the shelves, process new and damaged books.  They also help your child locate materials when I am swamped by the number of children who need help within such a short class period.

Parents have generously given their time to helping not only their own child’s class, but sometimes a class without a library parent volunteer. Some have met in groups to repair books and work on other projects.  Daisy Zook, our PTA President, and Elizabeth Chung are the parents responsible for organizing this team, so if you are interested in climbing aboard, please contact them.

I have read that the jobs your child will hold in the future have not yet been created and that the strongest gifts we can give him or her is a thirst for knowledge and the tools to seek it.  I am hoping that our school library will be the launching pad to begin this journey.  I want the library to be your child’s favorite room at Nixon!

Thank you, PTA, for your considerable support.  I am looking forward to a great, new, school year!

Janice Mulholland